Long Beach City Manager Jack Schnirman is drawing a line in the sand, and it’s not just to separate swimmers from surfers.

He is drawing a line to rebalance spending and revenues, calling for drastic steps including layoffs and new taxes to avoid a $10 million budget deficit.

Recently, the city’s debt was downgraded to a notch above junk bond status. At the heart of the problem: too many city workers.

“We’ve seen a hiring spike in the last few years before we took office where quite honestly the amount of personnel is unsupportable and unsustainable,” said Schnirman.

So he has called for the layoff of 67 workers, and has proposed increasing property taxes by four percent, while adding a temporary three-year tax surcharge of 11.9 percent.

Tough medicine, indeed. But doable. Long Beach is a relatively wealthy community, and can certainly raise the revenue it needs.

Schnirman expects that he will find enough votes on the city council to support his plan. Earlier, the council voted to declare a fiscal emergency.

But taxpayers also need to be assured that this city administration has sworn off past excesses that saw Long Beach keep spending and hiring as its debt ballooned.