Per the San Diego Reader, 14 of San Diego County’s 18 cities are attempting to manage upside down budgets, with nine having shortfalls in the millions.
Since that Jan. 21 story, the Chula Vista City Council has voted 4-1 to conduct a May mail ballot for a one percent sales tax increase. John McCann was the lone nay vote. The special election will cost the region’s second largest city $250,000.
Chula Vista joins three other cities with recent local sales taxes measures, El Cajon, La Mesa and National City, all of them passing.
Don’t expect any of this to change soon. Underlying the fiscal problems is a dysfunctional system in which cities must rely mostly on sales tax revenue while the bulk of the locally-generated property taxes flow into state coffers. Anytime the economy turns sour and sales taxes are down as a result, municipalities suffer, while California government continues to have its own blind-to-reality problems, often resulting in further State actions to transfer local monies to cover its fiscal ineptitude.
The other prong of the local financial problems is a public employee pension and benefits system run amok. Some cities — San Diego, most notably — are now starting to take action in this regard, but thus far it appears to mostly be limited to new hires as well as non-public safety positions. Rolling back previously-approved retirement benefits simply may not pass the legal muster, not to mention the question of whether it’s even right to renege on pension funding already committed to employees. So, with any changes to the benefits system being only for future hires, not those already employed, cities will reap any positives only over the long term.
Still, no reason not to immediately look at the long term, even though local governments need to address their current shortfalls in the present.
Aside from the need to address both the state-local funding structures and the current benefits systems, a handful of city elected officials have proposed other solutions to their fiscal woes. I’m asking any mayor or councilmember who would like — in San Diego County or not — to weigh in over the next several days at barryjantz@cox.net with their ideas, solutions, and perspectives. Free market thoughts are preferred, at least on these pages. Be as brief as possible, for use in a future column.
In the meantime, have a super day and a great week.