North Korea is threatening to nuke the United States, but in Los Angeles, City Councilmen Mitchell Englander and Joe Buscaino are back at it with their threats to bomb property owners.
Why worry about North Korea when we have these two gentlemen?
They are prepared to exercise the nuclear option by implementing a parcel tax to cover the debt service of their bond proposal.
The pair claims the cost per property, assuming a value of $350,000, would start at $24 per year and peak at $120 in ten years. Cheaper than the damage we incur to our cars from streets that resemble the Oregon Trail; at least that’s what the good councilmen say.
Instead of being relieved by the promise of the so-called savings, we should be upset that we have paid a hidden tax on our cars all these years with nothing to show for it.
If the parcel tax were the only increase property owners faced in the years to come, perhaps it would not be that big a deal. However, we face a steady stream of utility rate increases. On top of that, tax increases will always loom due to ever-increasing union benefits (because it is unlikely the council will ever require a sufficient level of employee contributions). Sidewalk repairs are estimated to cost $1 billion – no telling what financing scheme will be used for that sum.
It is not as if we can compensate for years of deferred maintenance and neglect without going into debt and paying for it with new sources of revenue, but before we absorb another penny in taxes – especially a tax that hits a single class of residents – we must insist the city deal with the structural deficit caused by generous retirement benefits for city workers. These benefits account for the fastest growing cost component in the general fund.
Mayoral candidates Greuel and Garcetti should take a position on this issue.
We deserve an answer.
Excellent article!! No new taxes until we see meaningful pension reform. This City Council claims to have reformed pensions. What a joke! All they did was reduce pensions and retiree benefits for NEW hires, not existing City employees and not even the new hire police and fire. This is an outrage! There will be a tsunami of boomers retiring soon and LA City will become the next Stockton when that happens. Already, street sweeping has been reduced from every 4 weeks to ev. 27 weeks on “open routes” (where they do not ticket on a given sweeping day. There are zero dollars budgeted for sidewalk repairs and tree trimming; they only do those in emergencies. This City Council is so beholding to the unions that none of them will touch the extravagant pensions. My friend retired from LAFD and he receives $127k per year pension plus cost of living increases each year, plus gold plated dental, vision and medical for life for he and his wife. AND, his wife will get 100% of all that when he passes on. Let’s stop the hero worshiping. Yes, they have a challenging job in police and fire but is the sky the limit on what they should receive? Who in private sector gets that? Pensions+retiree benefits currently consume 32% of the labor budget and soon it will consume half. Just take a look at Stockton and San Bernardino to see where we are heading…not a pretty picture. And, when we complain about the 4 foot tall weeds along our major streets in Northridge, we are told we can deliver Did You Know letters to let the adjacent owners know they are responsible to take care of the weeds and sidewalk debris OR we can clean up our violating neighbors’ parkways ourselves. We tried the DYK letters and they don’t work. So we clean the parkways, sidewalk, gutters and storm drains every Thursday 8 to noon for THREE YEARS now. We pay almost the highest taxes in the nation and then we are told we can clean up the City’s messes too. Disgraceful!
Outstanding! I could not agree more! What is true here is true in so many other communities across the state, across the nation. I live in San Luis Obispo and this could have been written about our city.
A group I belong to here tried a few years ago to amend the city charter to prohibit any new fees, fines, taxes or surcharges, without a vote of the people; and restrict increases in existing fees, fines, surcharges, etc. to the increase in the cost of living index unless approved by a vote of the people. The idea was to starve the city to force it to make the necessary structural changes to return to fiscal saniy and to make citizens aware of what the city was doing. Sad to say we did not get enough valid signatures to qualify. But it’s still a viable idea that I want to pass on here.
[…] Member Mitch Englander has taken his quest for a $3 billion bond measure on the […]