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Sunday, August 2, 1998

Citizens of Boulder did not vote to cut valuable service

By Leslie Durgin and Phoebe Norton

At its July 21 meeting City Council began discussions whether to adopt a policy that would have the effect of paying twice for public safety services while cutting back valuable services to do so. This unusually notion arises from council deliberations on the future funding of public safety services after the seven-year sunset of the recently passed public safety sales tax. Some members of City Council apparently believe that the services provided for by this tax should be part of basic city spending, not financed by a special tax, as was voted by the citizens. To be ready to transfer these new policy services from the .15 percent sales tax after it expires at the end of 2004, council is considering whether or not to reduce spending from the city's 1999 budget to the tune of $500,000, and similar amounts in each succeeding year of the tax, to prepare for the impact of cutting $4 million from the 2005 city budget in on fell swoop.

What this means is that $500,000 will be slashed from the city's 1999 general fund; the 2000 budget will be lessened by $1 million from today's levels; 2001's budget will be $1.5 million less than today; and so on until we reach a level approximately $4 million below current spending to replace the amount generated by the new tax and earmarked for public safety when it expires. All these cuts would be made even though we are collecting approximately $4 million annually through the .15 percent public safety tax specifically for this purpose.

To date, council has been discussing this issue based on some misconceptions of what was recommended by the Public Safety Task Force (PSTF) and voted by the citizens. Before council adopts a policy that would have such far reaching effects on other areas of the city budget, two points should be made clear to both City Council and the public:

The PSTF did not recommend that City Council start cutting other programs now to be in a position to take the additional police officers into the general fund when the tax expires, as some have contended. Nor did the task force recommend that the tax be replaced with general funds after it expires. Both of these avenues were discussed, but no consensus was reached on either issue. The task force's final report to City Council states:

"The PSTF is recommending a 2 mill increase in Property Tax and an .015 increase in Sales Tax...The PSTF vote recommends a sunset on the sales tax after seven (7) years, but not the property tax..The PSTF suggests that after the seven-year phase-in, a citizens group be appointed to review the current priorities and consider a recommendation on the funding for public safety efforts for the remainder of the finding cycle, or for a period of 5-7 years."

The citizens of Boulder did not vote to cut services. Last fall, the citizens of Boulder voted to increase sales taxes by .15 percent for a period of seven years to pay for additional public safety services. Nowhere in the ballot language was there any notion that other city services would be cut after the expiration of the tax. Were such language include in the ballot, we seriously doubt that the initiative in the ballot, we seriously doubt that the initiative would have passed.

We agree, as did the citizens of Boulder last fall, that the city's public safety services could and should be strengthened through the passage of this new tax. But the concept now being discussed - to cut other important services to pay for police officers - is harmful to the goal of a safer community.

Let us assume, for a moment, that it is a wise idea to cut the city budget by $4 million in order to pay for the police programs now funded through the .15 percent public safety sales tax once it expires. What would those $4 million in cuts consist of?

Certainly, we know these cuts would not come from capital improvement and land acquisition taxes, which are earmarked for specific purposes. Nor could they be made from grants the city receives from the federal government, such as for transportation and community development; these also must be spent for specific purposes. That leaves the general fund and those taxes whose earmark is soon to expire, including the .15 percent sales tax for human services and other purposes. Four million dollars of cuts in these services would be deep and to the bone - not limited to "administrative savings."

Council will be presented at its Aug. 4 meeting with a list of programs which could potentially be cut to support, such an effort, many of which also contribute to public safety and the quality of life in Boulder, including funding for Boulder County Safehouse, the Homeless Shelter, Emergency Family Assistance Association, Community Food Share, Boulder County Legal Aid, the Mental Health Center's emergency psychiatric services, the spring cleanup, the library system, the visitors and conference bureau and animal control through the Humane Society. Are these types of cuts what Boulder citizens had in mind when they passed an initiative to raise their taxes?

We don't believe the city can sustain this lever of cuts and retain the quality of life and level of public safety that has made Boulder such a special place to live.

The current direction that City Council seems to be taking is unwise and is based on information that is not accurate. As members of the Public Safety Task Force we urge council to adopt the recommendations presented to its just one year ago. Don't cut current valuable services to fund a tax that is already paid for. And before that tax is due to expire, resubmit the .15 percent public safety tax to the voting public with the questions: Do you want to continue to pay for additional police service, or not?

(Leslie Durgin and Phoebe Norton were both members of the Public Safety Task Force._