Update: As predicted, the state budget will be "balanced" in part by taking revenue from local governments. Read Timm Herdt's story here.
ALTHOUGH THE IDEA of increasing Ventura's sales tax in a recession may not be playing well in all corners, if the measure passes in November, it will generate an extra estimated $8 million annually over the next four years that all stays in Ventura. Currently only a small percentage of the sales tax we pay stays local.
This comes as the governor and our legislators have devised various methods of snatching even more local revenues. The May revise floated a proposal to borrow eight percent of property tax receipts from cities, counties, and special districts received in 2008‑09. Another recent scheme was proposed to divert gas tax money up to Sacramento that is used to maintain local streets. It's no wonder that the League of California Cities is up in arms against these deals.
Two other bills, SB 80 and SB 3x 29, would send redevelopment agency money to K-12 schools that cities now use for construction projects. Last year the California Redevelopment Association successfully sued the state to stop a similar bill.
City officials recently estimated Ventura could lose nearly $3 million in revenues to Sacramento on top of the difficult $11 million in service cuts and pay reductions already made to balance the current two-year budget.
The proposed 1/2-cent sales tax increase, which will sunset in four years, will cost each resident 22 cents a day, according to the city's finance staff. With a majority vote required and not a 2/3, it's similar to general-use measures recently passed in the neighboring cities of Oxnard and Port Hueneme.
THE SPENDING PLAN for the proposed revenue increase was outlined by staff and voted on by Council Monday night. It's a list of priority items which have suffered in the recent round of cuts:
- 40 percent will go to public safety, which will include restoring and supplementing our roving Medic Engine 10 service and the Downtown foot patrols. Recent requests for federal COPS grants were not successful.
- 35 percent will go to street repair, infrastructure maintenance, parks and public transit.
- 15 percent will go toward clean and safe beaches, which will include money to help Pierpont Beach residents with their weighty sand issues and more to help the city meet new costly federal and state water quality requirements.
- 6 percent will go to supplement county funding for our libraries.
- 4 percent will go toward maintaining and building effective community partnerships, which include social services grants and cultural grants to local non-profits.
An 11-member citizen advisory committee would be appointed to oversee the expenditures. Recent polling and past voting on Measure P6 shows the new measure has a decent chance of passage.
As the current dysfunction in Sacramento goes on, it's a safe bet that school districts, cities and counties will work for more local control of funds.
How exciting Marie. An innovative way to tax our residents. Wow! We should be very proud of this discovery. It used to be we were proud of putting man on the moon. Now we can be proud of higher sales tax. Go government! Sock it to us. Hurt me more!
Some of us feel a lot more hurt by our libraries closing and our streets not being paved than by paying 22 cents a day for these things. Perhaps you'd care to donate to the Friends of the Library?
Some of us feel a lot more hurt by our libraries closing and our streets not being paved than by paying 22 cents a day for these things. Perhaps you'd care to donate to the Friends of the Library?
While the 'spending plan' looks good on paper, it is almost worth the cost of the paper it is printed on. There is NOTHING to stop Rick Cole and his cronies on the council from spending this new money on whatever floats their boat. Can you say 'consultants'?
"An 11-member citizen advisory committee would be appointed to oversee the expenditures." Is this in the same vein as the 'blue ribbon' committee that convinced the city council that putting this on the ballot would be a good idea? The same bunch of city hall cronies that will tell the council what the council wants to hear?
"The proposed 1/2-cent sales tax increase, which will sunset in four years"
Really? Sunset in four years? Wanna bet? I've got $1,000 to your favorite cause that says (IF it passes), that this tax will last longer than 4 years. Once the pig has his nose in the trough, he can't stop. That is one reason were in the fiscal mess we are in now.
"... will cost each resident 22 cents a day, according to the city's finance staff."
Now, let's do some math, shall we?
$.22 * 365 = $80.30
So we have ~$80 annually per resident.
Let's assume 103,000 'residents' and we get $8,270,900
Now, how many of the 'residents' have any money to spend, let alone $80/per year (and that is just the 1/2% tax)? I know my children don't. I know plenty of children that don't spend any where near that kind of money. Now if the city's finance staff did the calculations based on current tax revenue, it is a little disingenuous to report that this new tax will "cost each resident 22 cents a day". In reality it will cost the residents that spend the money much more, to make up for the residents (children) that aren't spending anything.
No pushovers on that blue ribbon committee. Quite the contrary; there were some really vocal anti-tax members.
The 22 cents is a figurative example. Your argument is specious
peter piper says:
"No pushovers on that blue ribbon committee. Quite the contrary; there were some really vocal anti-tax members."
And yet the city is still going through with this ballot measure. The city also spent thou$and$ of dollars on their "poll" to be told what they wanted to hear.
That adds up to the city hearing what they want to hear. I predict that the city council and the city manager will be crying election night.
"The 22 cents is a figurative example. Your argument is specious"
My argument is that based on current tax revenue, 'city staff' figured the 1/2% increase and then divided it by the TOTAL number of residents in the city. Considering that there are many children (that don't spend money) the $.22/resident is an unrealistic number. Sort of like when the Feds start spouting how much the deficit comes to for every man, woman, and child. Unless that child is earning and spending, then they aren't a factor.
You forgot to factor in visitors to our city in your calculations.
I think every government should just listen to extremist anonymous bloggers to make all decisions. Forget polling, committees, focus group and town halls. Cowardly keyboard jockeys should call all the shots.
peter piper either does not live here and/or works for the government.
Yes, there were anti-tax people on the Blue Ribbon committee, but don't forget all were appointed by the council, which currently leans very liberal. It was a politically informed decision (pro government).
I would like to see the real math behind the 22 cents a day, Marie. Without a fully explained calculation with verifiable data it means nothing. Any forward-looking projections based solely on past data, especially in a declining economy, is going to be inaccurate.
Not even close whalderman. The political leanings of the current council mirror almost exactly the voting public per current registration figures.
Wendy those figures come directly from City CEO Jay Panzica's presentation to the Council. He was working from a figure of $10 million annually, which I think is optimistic. Given a $10 million figure, he said that represents about $94 per year per resident or 26 cents per day. But Ventura Visitors Bureau data says about $3 million annually in sales tax income comes from people outside the city who shop here. About 14 percent. So he factored that in to reduce the 26 cents per day to 22 cents. If we only generated $8 million and not the $10 million, it would be less. I know you have a good relationship with him so please go back to him to confirm.
I am presenting data here that I believe to be accurate. If bloggers here believe the math is bad or the poll was rigged, I would only ask for proof of this. So far I have seen none.
Thanks for writing a detailed and policy focused blog.
Thanks, Marie. Very helpful. So, using these numbers, a family of four would pay approximately $321 more per year for purchases made in Ventura ($1,285 over the course of 4 years).
The poll was not "rigged." It was, in my opinion, moderate push. But that's to be expected. You know how those things work. It's moot now anyway. The voters will decide.
peter piper, thanks, but until you provide your real name it's impossible to prove your claim.
It would put us at the same rate as Santa Barbara, Oxnard and Port Hueneme.
They conducted the poll first without any persuasive arguments for and against. They only presented it as it would likely appear on the ballot. Then they presented arguments both for and against that would come up in a normal campaign. That's really standard polling stuff.
I've already donated half my family of four's increased sales tax bill to the Friends of the Library this year. It's all relative.
Trying to keep up with the neighbors is no good reason to do anything.
And, yes, sales tax is relative. When the percentage goes up, people pay more. Whether the rate is 10, 50, or 100 percent, it's still all relative.
Always look to see who's paying for any poll, and what they are hoping to accomplish. Politics is rife with spin and Socratian word play. It's a major tool in the toolbox.
If an anti-tax group had paid for the poll, you better believe these "neutral" questions would have been worded differently. If they could craft the ballot wording too, the voting results would be different.
And sorry, nice word play, but you don't get to "donate" your sales tax (due now and or in the future) to a group of your choosing. It will be collected and distributed as required by law.
And I don't have issues with the spending plan. Happy to donate my family's share to public safety, infrastructure, beaches, libraries and community groups in the City of Ventura.
I donate far, far more in money and time to the various public/private partnerships I am involved with. Rather see the extra money stay here than going up to Sacramento.
According to my sources, they're currently haggling up in Sacramento about how much money to borrow/take from cities, a point nobody seems to want to discuss here but me.
My name is Howard Cox. Does that help you whalderman?
Marie and Whalderman:
An interesting exchange of views, to be sure..
Generally, my view on this matter is closer to Whalderman's than Marie's...
Rhetorical questions aside regarding the methodological validity and predictive significance of the City-funded poll , they became moot once the six person supermajority (Councilman Neal Andrews dissenting) on the City Council voted last week to place the Sales Tax Measure on the November 2009 ballot.
Notwithstanding the Council's action, the fundamental problem is the State and local economy stupid.. And more particularly, it is the dramatically growing State and local unemployment rate, stupid..
From May of 2008 to May of 2009, California's unemployment rate jumped from 6.8% to 11.5%. By comparison, California's recent unemployment rate was 2% higher than the 9.4% national rate in May 2009.
Statewide, the May 2009 unemployment figure was reported by EDD as 2,138,000 or some 885,000 more Californians out of work over last May. In Ventura County, more than 41,000 people were reported unemployed in May of 2009, versus 23,000 a year earlier.
While I sincerely hope it doesn't, absent a miraculous and speedy recovery in the State’s economy, it is likely that the State's unemployment rate may hit a high of 15% within the next six to nine months.
Regardless of the merits or lack of merits of Mssr. Cole's proposed, wishful spending plan for the $8 Million in projected new City Sales Tax revenues should the Sales Tax measure pass, the political timing couldn't be worse.
No matter how seductive Mssr. Cole thinks that his putative public benefit argument will sound to the voters of Ventura in November, even he can’t squeeze increased local Sales tax blood out of a local working class stone which is shrinking in size every day.
And remember, the average working class family of four in this State (assuming they still have a job) are being hit by $1,000 to $1,200 in increased State sales taxes, income tax surcharges, and State fees due to the $12 Billion in new taxes and fees approved by our dysfunctional State Legislature and signed into law by our Girly-Man Governator back in February.
Absent a miraculous and speedy recovery in both the State and local economy, during the next four months, which I hope happens, my prediction is that the City’s Sales Tax Measure will go down to defeat..
NostraDemus
All polls I have read say California voters want a balanced approach of cuts and tax increases and don't want to see broad cuts to education. That's the approach I advocate for as well.
Balance.
And we need to pay attention to keeping our businesses growing and thriving.
How about having 100% of the proposed ventura city sales tax increase remain in the pockets of the taxpayers...by voting down this tax grab......
Public employee pay and perks are already out of hand.....and especially out of hand compared to the private sector.
Public safety is already bloated with money....let's have a ten year comparison of public safety spending in ventura...how much was the city spending ten years ago and how much does it spend now.....
most city, county and state budgets in calfiornia have doubled in past ten years...along with salaries......public employees have nothing to complain about, as they still have their jobs...while we have 10% unemployment in the county's private sector....
heck, you could say public sector employment in the county is above 100%....as some county and city employees around here receive a government pension and a government pay check
Sorry, wrong, many of us don't still have our jobs.
There is plenty of money to keep every teacher employed.....but the administrative side prefers to keep the fat cats in administration fat
Do the math...california school get over $10,000 per student total from all sources....that is $300,000 per 30 student class room......with $100,000 going to teacher salary and benefits...that leaves $200,000 to go where?
Andy Levinson:
Agreed. The students whom teachers instruct should be the focus of our investment in public education, not the highly-paid educational bureaucratic elites in Sacramento nor six-figure salaried Superintendents in local school district offices.
As far as I'm concerned, far too many Superintendents and Principals are part of the problem, and not the solution. Further, particularly in Sacramento, there are far too many highly-paid educational bureaucrats calling far too many important educational policy shots. And further, by any reasonable performance standard, most of those folks do not produce strategically meaningful nor quantitatively measurable results commensurate with the billions of tax dollars invested in our K-12 public schools in this State.
And, this was only made worse due to the unholy political alliance of Democrats Ted Kennedy and George Miller and Republicans George Bush and Margaret Spellings who were principally responsible for the educational abomination called the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001.
Statistically neutered No Child Left Behind bogus test scores don’t matter. What matters are outcome based school performance measures like: graduation rates, the effectiveness of high-performing teacher engagement and retention incentives, measurable evidence of high parental involvement in school-site governance, a culture of continuous business process improvements in local school district business offices, and verifiable cost savings resulting from such continuous improvement process efforts being reinvested into the classroom.
In short, are we preparing our students to be critically thinking, economically productive and civically engaged citizens of the State of California or not? If we fail in this then regardless of how much in State tax revenues we guarantee K-12 public schools, either through political deals or voter-backed initiatives, as a State we will have lost our competitive cognitive edge in a 21st Century global economy, possibly forever..
NostraDemus
NostraDemus
School superintendents throughout california also get housing subsidies on top of their $200,000 salaries....
Excessive salaries are everywhere...we have a $228,000 city manager in T.O., ventura county police and fire chiefs, and DA make over $200,000....we are being fleeced by our public employees.....the business of government is excessive salaries and pensions and nothing else
University of california president: $591,000 salary + $135,000
in perks + free housing