Measure I is too Risky

By Martin L. Edwards

"The small amount of savings per person realized by cutting the utility tax as proposed in Measure I, is not worth the risks to public safety and services inherent in it's passage."

While we are in fact being taxed on higher energy bills in some cases, we need to realize that the city has to pay for it's energy at a higher rate too. Let's not forget that. Secondly, the estimated balance for July 1, 2001, included savings based on vacancies in a number of city positions. These vancancies need to be filled. If that were taken into consideration our city's expenditure's would be more like 144 million dollars. In addition, just as there were transfers into the city general fund, there are transfers out totaling nearly 11 million dollars. Part of that includes the transfer out of over 4 million dollars to our library fund. I doubt many Stocktonians could get excited about seeing our libraries cut even further.

The long and short is that when all is said and done our estimated balance for June 2002 will probably be somewhere around 3 million dollars or less. This is not much of a cushion for our city in the event of an emergency or a prolonged recession should that be the case.

Proponents have also argued that Stockton's User Utility Tax at 8% is much higher than cities around us and that some cities have no utility tax at all. Well let's be fair to our city and compare apples to apples, not apples to oranges. The only city around us with no UUT (User Utility Tax) is Lodi. The reason for this is that Lodi ownes it's own utilities. Residents in Lodi for the most part pay higher energy fees than we do and the city takes a full 12% of that amount for Lodi's general fund. And Lodi is not an urban city like Stockton. Comparing us to other urban cities of comparable population and size we see that Long Beach is at 8%, Sacramento and Oakland are both at 7.5%, Glendale is at 7%, and Riverside is at 6.5%.

Stockton also makes allowance for industry and business by providing Utility User Tax Enterprise Zone Rebates. That is just one of the reasons that a large company like Sodexho is locating a huge laundry service corporation to Stockton and bringing 500 new jobs with it. And we are also taking cae of the poor and lower income people with utility tax discounts through the CARE program.

The fact is this. When we don't single out just the utility tax and look at all the different fees and taxes that you and I pay, Stockton is a value. Comparing the amount of money going into the city's general fund with the amounts people pay in other cities of comparable size and demographics, Stockton' per capita General Fund Revenue is 10% less than the eight-city average.

If Measure I passes I believe we will have to see cuts in our police and fire departments. Initially we will loose 23 police officers eliminating our Public Schools Resource Officers programs and after school programs. We will loose an entire ladder engine company and 12 firefighters. It's possible that two thirds of our mid-street lighting may have to be turned off and library hours will be cut again. Loose police and firefighters and make the streets darker? I'm just betting that our home owners and car insurance rates will go up, probably a lot more than the 6-10 dollars a month we will save. These are just a few of the services we stand to loose if Measure I passes.

So you may ask, "what if I'm wrong?" Well if I'm wrong and Measure I is defeated, it won't bring any harm to our city at all. If we defeat Measure I and then there is the huge excess in the budget that the proponents say there will be, then we can go ahead and push the city to cut the tax. We don't need an election year campaign initiative to cut the taxes. The Mayor and City Council can do that without one. But if the proponents are wrong, and I think in this case they are, and Measure I passes, we will be immeasureably harmed. And we won't be able to undo the damage without a ballot initiative two years later. Don't even ask me how I feel about Ralph Lee White's measure. If I is bad, his is awful.

Most of us will only save somewhere between 3 to 12 dollars a month if Measure I passes. We've done without it this long, let's not go backwards. Let's keep Stockton moving forward. Vote no on Measure I.

Thank you.