A Taxing Situation; San Rafael Tells Residents of Its Looming Financial Crisis
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Summary
Back at the beginning of the year, the city conducted a survey to take the pulse of its residents. Did they think City Hall was running smoothly? Did they think crisis lay hidden over the next ridge? "Our citizen satisfaction survey confirmed that the majority of our residents believed that the city is in either good or excellent financial condition," says San Rafael City Manager Rod Gould. The city embarked on a series of more than 25 meetings with community groups and neighborhood associations to disabuse residents of that complacent notion. "It came as a great shock," says Gould, for residents to learn that the city has "had three years of financial duress and is headed into a fourth year of real financial difficulty."
It's grass-roots democracy in action. It's up to residents. "People are going to have to decide," says Gould, "what are the important city services, and what are they willing to pay for them. The question is going to be, Do you want to invest a little more in city services or step on the slippery slope toward mediocrity - or worse?"Although virtually everyone agrees some action must be taken, the business community is leery of hiking the local sales tax as a way to boost revenue. "Right now, local business owners are saying they are losing a lot of business to Internet sales," says Elissa Giambastiani, executive director of the San Rafael Chamber of Commerce. "Anything that raises their price is a disincentive to shop at local stores. We have a concern about that. We also think the city should do more analysis on how much more it actually needs for specific services." Giambastiani, speaking for the business community, lays out a tough choice that she says cities all across the country must tackle. Employee salaries and benefits account for much of a city's budget responsibilities, she says, and that's the case in San Rafael. "We feel that all levels of government, including the city of San Rafael, need to seriously look at benefits [for public employees, like police, fire and public works personnel] because taxpayers are not going to be able to continue to pay the burden. It's something that needs to come to the front of the discussion."See the full content of this document
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A Taxing Situation; San Rafael Tells Residents of Its Looming Financial Crisis
San Rafael residents are starting to get the message. At least that's what City Hall hopes after the second of three community meetings aimed at letting everyone know the dire financial situation the city will soon face. Essential services will have to be trimmed unless the city finds new "revenue streams." In plain language: Unless the city raises tax revenue of some kind, police, fire public works and the like will suffer the consequences...
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