From: Jacob Patterson
To:
Subject: Public Comment -- 6/12/23 CC mtg., Item No. 8B, Streets Tax Date: Thursday, June 08, 2023 5:03:59 PM
City Council,
If you are going to ask the voters to extend the existing special streets tax, I recommend two modifications from last time.
First, I would not have the tax sunset this time. We will always need funding to maintain and repair our streets, alleys, and sidewalks, so why make the voters reapprove the tax every ten years?
Second, I recommend tightening the language about permitted uses and make it explicit that it can only be used for paving streets and alleys and the associated sidewalk segments. I do not think the funding should be used for other underground infrastructure like our storm drain system, which, although fed from flows off our streets, is not actually a component of the streets themselves. In fact, I will not vote for a special tax that is used for anything other than our paving projects and think that the City's past (IMO) misuse of this restricted funding for storm drain projects is a very valid reason for people to not vote for this extension. Moreover, based on the projected funding and to be generated and the much higher funding amount for projected paving needs means that we have more than enough paving projects to spend this money on without diverting it to other purposes like our storm drain systems. If we want to fund improvements to the storm drain system, we should identify alternative funding sources for those projects.
Regards,
--Jacob