Analyzing the Impact of Santa Cruz's Failed Measure T
Local voters have approved numerous taxes in recent years, but measure that would have cost the equivalent of a mocha each month went down
Story by Curtis Cartier
The $2.5 million per year Measure T would have raised for emergency services averages about $3.76 per month for each of Santa Cruz’s 55,364 residents. That’s about the cost of a mocha at Lulu’s, five hours of parking on Beach Street or hot dogs, sodas and a tip for two at Costco.
But that extra change proved too much to bear for Santa Cruz voters when Measure T failed by less than 2 percent of the votes cast. The Aug. 26 mail-in ballot would have raised phone line taxes from $1.81 to $3.49 to pay for 911 services and other police expenses. And since Santa Cruzans carry a long history as a tax-friendly voting bloc, Measure T’s failure has many residents and lawmakers blaming poor timing and a lack of campaign effort for its demise.
“I think there was an assumption that the same people who had supported past measures would automatically support Measure T,” says Councilman Ed Porter. “People who had put in long nights supporting other campaigns got tired and there was a miscalculation of the effort that was needed to get it passed. The supporters are out there–they just didn’t vote.”
Measure T lost by less than 200 votes, but other tax hikes that total much more than $3.76 per month have passed by landslides in the last few years. Just three months ago Measure R, a quarter-cent library improvement sales tax hike from the ’90s, was made permanent by a resounding 73 percent yes vote. As a countywide tax, Measure R brought in $6.7 million last year, according to Santa Cruz Finance Director Sandra Benoit. That’s an extra $2.23 per month for each of the county’s roughly 250,000 residents.
In February, three education-related measures, including a $24-per-year increase on existing $81 parcel taxes for properties within Santa Cruz Elementary School District and an $18 million bond sale for the San Lorenzo Valley School District, were passed overwhelmingly by voters who turned out in numbers twice as high as Measure T’s 9,689 ballot casters. And although Measure O, the San Lorenzo school bond measure, is impossible to track financially until bond sales are finalized, Measure P, the elementary school parcel tax, came in on top of a parcel tax that generated $1,675,800 last year. That translates to a colossal $8.75 per month for the roughly 16,000 properties that fall into the district’s taxable area.
And not only school measures have passed with flying colors. In 2006, Measure H hiked up citywide sales taxes by one-quarter percent for use in the city’s general fund. The $2.4 million generated by Measure H adds up to about $3.61 per month for Santa Cruz residents and is only a hair lower than the demands of Measure T.
Add that to the $2.23 from June’s Measure R, $8.75 for February’s Measure P and $3.61 for 2006’s Measure H, and you’ve got $14.59 in extra taxes Santa Cruz residents have agreed to fork over since 2006.
The 911 call center Measure T was aimed at supporting is still a vital service for Santa Cruz County, and the $1.3 million the city is expected to shell out every year for its operation will still need to be paid. That money will now have to come from other areas, and Mayor Ryan Coonerty is pointing at the city’s parks and recreation department as the likely financial scapegoat.
“Eighty percent of our general fund goes to police, fire and parks and recreation,” says Coonerty. “State law mandates we keep certain levels of police and firemen. So parks and recreation usually takes the brunt of cuts. In retrospect. I wish we would have waited for the November ballot and asked for a slightly lower increase.”
Among voters, a lack of information was commonly cited. In an informal survey by Metro Santa Cruz, nearly a dozen residents claimed to have no knowledge of the measure. Caren Dix, a community activist, said she heard about Measure T on the last day votes were accepted and couldn’t vote. Evan Kaufman, a farmer’s market vendor, said he would have voted enthusiastically for the initiative if he had been told about it.
“I think a couple of bucks on my phone bill would have been a lot better than taking it out of education or parks,” says Kaufman. “The money’s got to come from somewhere.”
