|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
The majority of the Pleasanton City Council last week reinforced the city’s stance on why residents should support a sales tax increase measure that is poised to be placed on the November ballot.
While the council did not make any decisions on the half-cent sales tax increase ballot initiative during its June 18 meeting — that vote will take place during the July 16 meeting — most of the council members agreed that if the city doesn’t pursue such a tax increase there will be significant cuts to city services that will greatly affect Pleasanton.
“None of us like to have to pay more, none of us wants greater taxes. I think as far as a revenue measure, this will have a far softer impact on our residents,” Vice Mayor Julie Testa said during the meeting. “If we don’t do this, there will be substantial changes to our quality of life. We don’t have a choice.”
Over the past couple of years, city staff have said the city is facing a severe and increasing structural deficit where expenses are growing faster than its revenues. Staff say this is being caused by several factors including increases in costs, slowing of real estate development, declining retail sales and reduced hotel tax revenue ever since the pandemic took a heavy toll on the hotel business.
According to the June 18 staff report, the current budget forecast indicates an “average budget shortfall of approximately $13 million annually over the next eight years, which city staff has been working to address proactively with a combination of reduced costs and new revenue.”
Staff have said the city has been working on ways to save money such as not hiring new people, limiting new service contacts, not starting new programs and even approving $2.5 million in reductions from the upcoming fiscal year’s budget. But staff have also said that will not be enough to address the deficit.
Staff have begun working on a cost saving plan by making significant cuts to city departments, which they presented to the council and community during a special meeting workshop on May 21. That plan, which the council did not approve, included reduced library hours, eliminating funding for crossing guards, closing one of the fire stations in Pleasanton and reducing police programs, among other cuts.
Instead of making those cuts, the city has been looking at a half-cent sales tax increase as a prominent revenue stream to help with the city’s ongoing budget deficit.
If the council votes on placing the measure on the ballot during the July 16 council meeting and the measure is approved by voters in November’s general election, it would raise the city’s current 10.25% sales tax rate to 10.75%, meaning the additional tax would add $5 on $1,000 taxable purchases.
Should the measure pass, staff said it would generate $10 million annually, which would remain in the city and does not go to the state.
City Manager Gerry Beaudin said at the meeting that the tax increase would sunset after 10 years and added that a sales tax would be considered a regressive tax compared to other taxes.
“Folks who have to buy certain things and make less money are ultimately going to have to pay a higher percentage of their income,” Beaudin said. “But what I will say in that regard is that there are a lot of exemptions that come with a sales tax and so there are ways to make it less regressive.”
Staff said things like prescription medicine, devices and groceries would be exempt from the tax. Rent, mortgage payments, utilities, and other items such as goods transmitted electronically would also be exempt from sales tax.
The city has been working since last September — which is when the council first directed staff to look into potential new revenue streams such as the tax increase — to survey the community, inform them on what’s going on with the budget and see where folks stand on placing such a revenue measure on the ballot.
During the June 18 meeting, the council reviewed all of the polling that has been going on since then and were able to get a better understanding on where the voters’ heads are in terms of either supporting or opposing the tax increase.
According to the presentation last week, while the surveys that were conducted over the past year weren’t a complete view of everybody in the city, the number of residents who support the tax increased from last fall to this past month.
The polling results showed that the majority of residents who were surveyed believed there is some need for additional funding in order to provide city services.
The council also reviewed the initial ballot language for the measure last week, which was also presented to the survey respondents.
The proposed ballot language reads as follows: “To maintain city services and prevent cuts, such as police and fire protection; 911 emergency response; disaster preparedness; pedestrian safety; parks maintenance; pothole repair and street maintenance; recreation programs; open space preservation; and other general government uses; shall the city of Pleasanton’s measure to establish a one-half-cent sales tax, providing approximately $10,000,000 annually for 10 years, keeping all funds local, with annual audits and public spending disclosure, be adopted?”
According to the polling results, 58% of the survey respondents said they supported the ballot language as presented, which is above the 50%-plus-one majority vote needed for the measure to pass in the November election. The poll also found that the floor of support appears to be relatively high in the mid-40 percentile.
However, there are still many challenges that the measure faces.
The polling results stated that less than half of the voters feel the city has an appreciable need for more funding and the support for the revenue measure dropped to just below the 50% threshold after folks who conducted the poll reviewed the for and against arguments related to the measure.
While at least one Pleasanton police staff member and one Livermore Pleasanton Fire Department chief spoke out to support the measure in order to maintain job positions and services at each department, the rest of the residents who spoke out during last week’s meeting told the council the measure either seems deceptive because there is a lack of trust or it seems unnecessary when the city can find other ways to save money.
“I strongly oppose the sales tax measure,” Pleasanton resident Jan Batcheller said during the meeting. “Government at all levels is the biggest cause of inflation. I have watched the governing of the city of Pleasanton closely and can see many ways to cut costs.”
She said as a business owner she knows cutting costs starts at the top and that the city needs to look at the city manager and attorney’s office, outside consultant fees and developments in East Pleasanton before thinking about any tax increases.
Batcheller said the city does not have a revenue problem, but instead has a spending problem and that the council majority might not see it that way, which is what fellow Pleasanton resident Vicki LaBarge also said.
LaBarge said with the council majority’s past record of voting for things like the new skatepark at the Ken Mercer Sports Park or the rehabilitation project for the historic Century House, she is skeptical of how the council plans on spending residents’ tax money.
“What will you personally and collectively do differently with our hard earned tax dollars?” she asked everyone on the council excluding Jack Balch. “Will this council make financial decisions that benefit the entire community and not special interests? Can we trust your words? Can we trust this council to spend our taxpayer money wisely?”
When Councilmember Valerie Arkin asked why LaBarge didn’t address Balch she said it was because she knows how Balch typically votes on budget or fiscal decisions.
Balch, who said the city should work on retaining employees throughout this budget deficit, was the only one on the dais who had a different viewpoint. While others like Arkin and Councilmember Jeff Nibert agreed that the city needs to pursue the tax increase now in order to address the budget deficit and not make cuts to significant services such as the police and fire departments, Balch said the city needs to take more time before pursuing the revenue measure.
“I think it would behoove us to pause — we do have a reserve, we can go a little longer on time — so that we build the community’s trust and we build the community’s base of knowledge related to why it’s needed or what is needed,” Balch said.
He referenced the Pleasanton Unified School District’s plan on forming a budget advisory committee which will look at ways to cut costs as it faces its own budget deficit and said the city should do something similar.
He also said the city should continue to look internally at ways to cutting costs by merging other departments, looking at the costs associated with the Century House and working with the district as PUSD gets ready to develop housing on its district-owned properties so that the city can benefit off of property taxes and other revenues that come with more homes.
On the other hand, Testa argued that the city doesn’t have a spending issue that can simply be fixed by cutting down on costs. She said it also isn’t the rest of the council’s fault that the city has such a large deficit.
Instead she pointed to the city’s pension obligations, which she said went up $90 million in one year, and how no other options discussed are going to begin to address those significant dollars coming out of the city’s general fund.
Mayor Karla Brown said the city has already been cutting down on costs and added that while she doesn’t know what the future of the skatepark or Century House will be — both projects have been paused funding wise — she knows this sales tax measure is the only way the city will be able to maintain its quality of life moving forward.
“If you live in a premier community, what really is a half-cent sales tax?” Brown asked. “We cut $2.5 million out of the budget, we don’t have another 10 to 13 (million dollars) to cut.”
“If there was a way to cut, don’t you think we would have done it by now?” she added.
Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly described the position of a Pleasanton PD staff member. Embarcadero Media Foundation regrets the error.
“If there was a way to cut, don’t you think we would have done it by now?” she added.”
No. “Progressive” politicians believe the government is the solution for everything. They promote equality of outcomes/results with their policies and resent/are offended by those who have more income/wealth than they “need”. The only “fiscally responsible” course of action for them when funding is short is to raise taxes.
Testa said we do not have a spending problem. From my vantage point, the skate park and that old house are a spending problem. A tax increase recognizes there is a spending problem. When there is a spending problem (e.g., excessive government spending) government raises taxes to address it.
Let’s break it down:
1. Identify the spending issue (e.g., budget deficit, unsustainable/unnecessary programs.
2. prepare a tax increase as a solution.
3. Communicate the tax increase to offset excessive spending.
4. A tax increase will have an equal impact on aggregate demand, for example, if the government increases tax by $10 million a year, it reduces aggregate demand by the same amount.
Suggesting closing a fire station and reducing police services is a political stunt to win support for a tax increase. It is disgraceful the majority city council is taunting this scenario. Let us close Callippe reserve, it is a money drain.
Shutter the firehouse, street sweeping services serve no impact, the sweeper drives down the middle of the street at 25 MPH with no vacuum and no brush deployed, and city-owned trees keep the streets immediately littered. Shutter Park activities that are a money drain, bands, and movies. Let residential neighborhoods finance the activity if they so want.
The city tree (arbor) program has cost the city millions of dollars, rethinking planting and maintenance, and the program is a money drain. Establish an army of neighborhood volunteers for everything. The Pleasanton City Council majority is not sincere in reducing costs. Their efforts to date have been dismal and deceiving.
Michael, good to see your name in a comment section since the weekly canned the town square. When that happened I ended my $$ support…PW…bad move