Tempe City Council has an issue: Its government is currently operating in the red after it lost about $25 million of tax revenue, mainly because state lawmakers forced a repeal of residential rental taxes.
In an attempt to fix their budget woes, the council has moved quickly — and with little public input — to push forward a plan that would hike the sales tax rate by a half-cent on every dollar spent. But for it to become law, voters will have to approve it in November.
If the half-cent increase is approved by voters, Tempe’s sales tax would become the highest in the East Valley at 2.3%, but still lower than Phoenix (2.8%) and much of the West Valley.
Last night, the council was scheduled to vote on whether to send the tax increase to the ballot, but they delayed the decision to May 14 after Councilman Randy Keating suggested a slight change to the city programs that would benefit from it.
Councilmember Randy Keating, whose proposal to move $10 million of funding from public safety initiatives to public pre-K programs was supported by colleagues.
Lisette Camacho, a deputy city manager, told the council she expects the increase will raise $50 million annually for city coffers — doubling the lost revenue that got Tempe in its current predicament. But that money, because of the measure’s language, would already be earmarked.
Under the initial plan, $10 million was proposed to go to transportation and $40 million will go to public safety initiatives — which would “strengthen the overall security of Tempe’s parks, neighborhoods and public spaces,” per a slide created by staff. Top brass of Tempe’s police and fire departments were at the meeting to paint their departments as lacking resources and on the brink, pointing to slower response times since 2005 as a marker of underfunding.
“The strain is not just felt on our patrol people, it’s also felt on our detectives,” Assistant Chief Dane Sorenson said. “For example, our special victims unit — which investigates sex crimes — they have an average case load of 35 to 40. In the industry, best practice is about 15 to 20.”
But to the ears of council critics, that translates to more funding for police and park rangers and surveillance cameras — which would allow the city to ratchet up its ongoing battle against the unhoused and their advocates.
Keating, however, proposed a tweak that seemed to land well among both councilmembers and more progressive residents: taking $10 million of the public safety funding and putting it toward Tempe’s pre-K program. The council approved that adjustment unanimously, and city staff are putting together ballot language for the official vote.
Some notable figures in the city are already questioning or rallying against the proposal — both for its substance and the council’s procedural decisions.
Council candidate Bobby Nichols, who’s challenging two incumbents in a May 19 runoff election, acknowledged the need to balance the budget. But he questioned why the tax increase needs to be for policing when there hasn’t been a proposed cut to the city’s $184 million public safety operating budget.
“Tempe could raise $40 million for affordable housing, employment programs, Pre-K, and other policies that reduce the cost of living for Tempe’s working families without directly impacting their daily expenses,” Nichols told us. “The city’s half-cent tax hike funds inefficient, expensive, and divisive policies, like the punishment of poverty and the surveillance of good Samaritans.”
Nichols, who’s been endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America, noted that the sales tax increase is regressive, so it would also hit poor and working-class people the hardest — though he did say at the meeting that he liked Keating’s suggestion to use a chunk of the money for pre-K programs, and he wants taxes to fund more programs that make life more affordable.
Pressure from the left flank isn’t the only pushback the centrist council might get.
Last week, staff introduced the plan to the council in a work session meeting that was attended by a few dozen people. Among the sparse crowd was former Tempe Mayor Mark Mitchell, who told us before the meeting that he had only heard whisperings about a tax increase, which he opposes. While he was on the council, he said, the city managed to make cuts across the board and avoid a tax increase in the aftermath of the Great Recession. He left the meeting Tuesday at 8 p.m. before he was called to speak by Mayor Corey Woods.
And a right-leaning council candidate who lost in a March election, Joe Forte, noted that pumping taxes higher than in neighboring Chandler, Mesa and Gilbert could hurt businesses in Tempe.
The council’s tactics are also drawing fire from residents, including frequent critic Ron Tapscott — whom Woods once called a “crazy uncle” behind closed doors and who told us that he filed an open meeting law complaint against the council.
He claimed the agenda didn’t give the required 24-hour notice the council would be discussing a tax increase, part of what he referred to as a pattern of avoiding public scrutiny.
But that’s far from his only criticism.
“I think the question is how is the city council exercising its fiduciary responsibility with taxpayers money, and now turning around and saying, ‘We’re in a deficit and we need to increase taxes on people,’” Tapscott told us. “Why in the world are we now looking at this deficit being covered when the city seems to be spending money on questionable projects — the most obvious one that’s occurred lately in the sign over Mill Avenue.”
Indeed, the blitz to hike the sales tax comes at a time when city residents and Phoenix New Times readers roast the new $2 million sign that the city installed on Mill Avenue, its nightlife district.
As it stands, staff are preparing a ballot measure that would bundle all three tax increases — a tenth of a penny for pre-K, a tenth of a penny for transportation and three-tenths for public safety — into one question. Councilwoman Nikki Amberg was the lone dissenter in a 6-1 vote to set up the referendum that way. She argued the taxes should be three separate questions.
It would certainly be interesting for them to be distinct ballot items. While there wasn’t a lot of general backlash at the meeting, dozens of speakers only voiced support for the tax increase to fund transportation, or preschool. But at the end of the day, it’s possible the silent majority of voters may lean more toward further funding law enforcement.
The council will vote to finalize the language of the ballot question at their next meeting on May 14. While the deadline to notify the county of an election is on May 7, Tempe City Clerk Kara DeArrastia told us the deadline for specific language is June 8.
Putting all its marbles in one basket may come with another risk for the city. If the tax increase doesn’t pass in November, then the city will likely have to make cuts across the board, Camacho said — which will open up a whole new can of worms
Let him draw the maps!: Now that the U.S. Supreme Court took a sledgehammer to the Voting Rights Act, Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen wants to redraw the state’s political districts, Ray Stern reports for the Republic. In Petersen’s view, “our maps are racist” and the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission should meet and “fix” them. (Arizona is among a handful of states that doesn’t let it’s politicians draft political maps — thanks to a voter initiative, that’s the commission’s job.) If the commission doesn’t do it, Petersen says he’ll sue.
Not as privileged as you think: The Arizona Court of Appeals says Attorney General Kris Mayes acted illegally when she withheld information about communications with the group that helped her in the “fake electors” case, per Capitol scribe Howie Fischer. The upshot of the court’s ruling is that Mayes will have to provide a detailed description of the documents she withheld to Judicial Watch and the trial judge, who would then decide whether the documents were legitimately withheld.
Bailout fallout: The superintendent of the Tolleson Union High School District is suing Republican state Rep. Matt Gress for defamation, Elenee Dao reports for ABC15. Superintendent Jeremy Calles locked horns with Gress last year over a $25 million property deal between the Tolleson and Isaac Elementary school districts. Now, Calles said Gress made false statements that implied Calles had improperly used public funds, which hurt Calles’ consulting business.
Scandal brewing: Yuma County Treasurer David Alexandre is facing allegations that he misused public funds, AZFamily’s Karina Bazarte reports. The county board of supervisors signed off on hiring an outside attorney to investigate the allegations, which first surfaced on social media and led to a county investigation that “identified several issues that require corrective action.”
The best way to combat local corruption is to hire more local reporters. Just sayin’.
Turning up the heat: Officials at Mesa Gateway Airport say the ICE holding facility on airport property is so consistently overcrowded that it may violate the lease agreement and the city’s fire codes, the Arizona Mirror’s Jerod MacDonald-Evoy reports. The certificate of occupancy allows for 203 people, but ICE moves as many as 777 people through the facility in a single day.
We were looking up Kalshi, the prediction market that Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes is going after, when we came across this gem from Surprise City Councilman Johnny Melton, AKA “His Excellency Lord of District 4.”
It sounds as absurd as it is predictable. But this type of thing is real.
Three candidates in Virginia, Texas and Minnesota bet on their own candidacies and got banned from Kalshi.
They were small wagers, about $100 each.
Which is honestly a little sad because they clearly didn’t believe in themselves enough to go big.
But it sets up the potential for an all-time grift. Why not run a high-profile campaign, place a huge wager that you’ll lose and then just tank the whole thing?
You’d walk away with millions and live out your days at luxury hotels on Napa vineyards.
Call it the Sinema Two-Step.