This compliments another theme that has been developing here on the blog, that being even a vote of the people will not stop the headlong rush at City Hall to take more money out of the pockets of people unfortunate enough to live under their thumb. The in process "do over vote" on the UUTax being the best example here. At 10% and spread out across a wide range of categories Sierra Madre has been paying the highest utility taxes in the State of California since 2008.
10% utility tax rates being something that City Hall obviously believes they have some sort of God-given right to receive since even an overwhelming rejection by the voters of Measure 12-1 and Measure 12-2 at the polls last April (click here) seems to mean nothing to them. Their need for taxes somehow being above the rights of those who pay them.
But if you think that the Great City Hall Money Grab is limited to just these two unfortunate cases, then I have the even more unfortunate duty of informing you that this just isn't the case. Below I have listed 10 instances where costs controlled by the City either have or will soon go up. If you can think of any others please be sure to share them with us here.
1) Permit fees for temporary use permits have gone up.
2) Overnight parking permits were raised. Just in time for Inter-Con.
3) Water rate increases are "in process."
4) Sewer rate increase is also underway.
5) Building permit fees? Way up.
6) Property taxes go up 2% a year, every year. Something not usually noted at City Council meetings, though the City does share in this bounty.
7) UUTaxes increased due to water rate raise.
8) Serial Edison electric rate increases have also increased the UUT.
9) Pool classes and related facility costs are higher after we contracted out, with the City taking its cut.
10) The City Council is closely looking at possibly raising the Development Impact Fees for new units.
The question that needs to be asked is why are we seeing across the board increases such as these? The City has come up with quite a few reasons for this, with the loss of the CRA to an equally rapacious regime in Sacramento being the showcase cause.
But is this true? Redevelopment funds such as those once controlled by our Community Redevelopment Agency could only be used for very specific purposes. Those having something to do with pulling our City out of its nonexistent blighted conditions and fostering a rebirth from being a theoretical slum. An absurd presupposition that only Joe Mosca believed, but you get the point.
Theoretically at least CRA funds could not be intermingled with our General Fund, and therefore did not have that much of an impact on the day to day running of the City of Sierra Madre. Something that cannot be said for the now cash forward categories we've listed above.
So why the headlong downtown money grab? I would argue that City Hall is attempting to remake itself into something that approximates the way far larger municipalities are run. In the name of "attracting and retaining" the kinds of employees needed in order to carry out their various agendas (such as so-called "green development"), benefits, pensions and salaries would all need to be increased. This so City Hall can be competitive with the other municipalities in this area when it comes attracting and retaining employees.
Even though the employees we have rarely seem to leave, with more than a few of them living in a higher economic and benefit strata than many of the people whose tax money sustains them.
There is another important question that must be asked here. Is this something that a small community of less than 11,000 people can afford to do? Can we financially enable a version of Los Angeles City Hall without taxing the residents to death? Do we become an almost exclusively upper middle class commuter bedroom community because the proud blue collar population that for decades has served as the strong backbone of Sierra Madre will have been taxed right out of town? And what about the effects on fixed income senior citizens?
If so, gentrification through taxation as practiced by an out of control City Hall could prove damaging to our community in ways that people have not yet even begun to consider.
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