Tax would steady police, fire

Spokane city voters would be asked in November to choose more taxes or fewer cops and firefighters under a resolution that gets its debut Monday afternoon before the Spokane City Council.

With the clock ticking toward the Nov. 8 ballot, the council will get its first official look during its afternoon briefing session at a resolution to lift the property tax levy lid. The proposal would raise an estimated $3.3 million in 2006 and again in 2007.

On Sept. 19 the council is scheduled to hold a public hearing and vote on the proposal, just four days ahead of the deadline for adding things to the ballot.

“The public doesn’t want cuts in public safety and library services,” Chud Wendle, chairman of a citizens committee appointed by Mayor Jim West, told the council on Tuesday.

If that’s true, a majority of the public will have to agree to lift the state-imposed lid on property tax by 32 cents per $1,000 in assessed valuation – about $48 on a house assessed at $150,000 – for two years as part of package of tax increases and employee concessions.

Key among the committee’s recommendations is a two-year limit in the ballot title, even though state law allows the levy lid to be put in abeyance for six years. Wendle said that limit would “build in accountability,” and prompt the city to seek more permanent solutions to its budget problems. If the proposal passes, the committee wants the city to hire an independent analyst to look for waste and duplication of services, which are typically the first arrows out of the quiver of tax increase opponents.

Mayor Jim West, who supports the ballot measure and the committee’s recommendations, said an independent analyst might have the best chance of pointing out longstanding practices that no longer make economic sense, and convincing city departments to change.

In a poll of 250 city voters authorized earlier this summer by West, 69 percent said they would be willing to pay higher property taxes to pay for police, fire and library services. By keeping the increase to 32 cents per $1,000, the proposal would need only a simple majority, rather than the 60 percent supermajority needed for a higher increase.

But that also means extra money from property taxes would provide slightly less than half of the $6.8 million gap between projected city expenses and revenues. To raise another $2.85 million, the committee urged the council to tack another 3 percent onto the city’s utility tax for the same period.

The utility tax hike, which is at the discretion of the council, would not appear on the ballot. But Gavin Cooley, the city’s chief financial officer, said the ballot measure will essentially lock the council into that increase by forbidding any public safety layoffs or closure of fire stations.

The ballot measure requires the city to “maintain police and fire services at 2005 levels” and open neighborhood libraries five days a week.

“It’s pretty specific,” Cooley said. Without the extra money from the utility tax boost, the city can’t avoid some cuts in police and fire, which comprise about 57 percent of the general fund budget, and can’t expand branch library service from their current three- or two-day schedules.

That 3 percent increase would raise the utility tax rate to 20 percent, giving Spokane the highest utility tax rate in the state. To ease the impact, City Councilwoman Cherie Rodgers suggested last week the city put a moratorium on a “rate-stabilization” charge that utility users also pay.

The city would also need to convince city employees to make about $850,000 per year in wage and benefit concessions – something this summer’s poll showed has support from city residents – and build in other adjustments to the budget.

The proposal to lift the levy lid would share the ballot with City Council races in each of Spokane’s three council districts. Incumbent Al French will be on the ballot in the Northeast District, as will Mary Verner if she survives the South District’s Sept. 20 primary. The Northwest District seat is open because Rodgers is being retired by term limits, but that won’t keep her possible replacements from talking about the proposed increase.