Concord City Council Votes To Place Measure G Sales Tax On Ballot

CONCORD, CA — The Concord City Council voted unanimously — 5-0 — Tuesday to place a local sales-tax revenue extension measure for voter consideration on the November ballot.

If enacted by voters, the measure would extend the city’s existing, voter-approved Measure Q local funding at a 1-cent rate to maintain fiscal stability and continue addressing priorities identified by the public, city officials said in a news release.

After conducting community outreach and engagement in 2019, the city continued to gather community feedback in April — amid the pandemic — to determine residents’ priorities. Together, more than 1,200 residents responded, identifying the following key services as top priorities to address:

• Supporting local businesses and residents through recovery from the COVID-19 crisis
• Maintaining 911 emergency response times
• Enhancing city street and pothole repair
• Preparing for and responding to natural disasters and health emergencies
• Maintaining gang prevention and crime investigation services

City officials said independent public opinion research, conducted by Godbe Research, indicated that as much as 71 percent of respondents would support a simple-majority requirement extension which, if enacted, would generate local funds to continue to address essential quality of life, health and safety preparedness services as cities around the nation contend with the impacts of the coronavirus crisis.

"We appreciate the community’s interest and participation in the past months, especially in these times," said City Manager Valerie Barone. "Extending this funding will be critical to addressing our local needs with locally controlled funding that cannot be taken by the State, and at a time when we cannot depend on adequate state or federal funding to address local relief and recovery efforts."

If the sales-tax measure is approved, city officials say all funding from the measure would continue to be subject to independent annual financial audits, public spending reports and an independent citizens’ oversight committee.

The 1-cent sales-tax increase would remain in place until ended by voters.

The related city staff report says in part:

"Measure Q, the existing half-cent local use and transactions (sales) tax measure, was originally passed by Concord voters in 2010 in response to one of the worst recessions in the Country’s history. Voters extended Measure Q in 2014. In 2010 and 2014, Measure Q was supported by voters to help the City maintain fiscal stability through a secure source of locally-controlled funding that was used specifically to maintain the public’s essential services and rebuild emergency reserve funds. With Measure Q revenues, the City has been able to preserve essential services and restore its emergency reserve funds. However, the City has not been able to fully address community priorities, such as repairing deteriorating local roads and ensuring local control over local tax dollars to support emergency response times and preparedness, community-based neighborhood police patrols, gang prevention, and park and recreation programs.

"Because these important community services and infrastructure needs cannot be fully met within the resources available, the Council has been working continuously over the last decade on creating fiscal stability and prioritizing city services. The City’s fiscal situation has become even more challenging due to COVID-19 and the State and County shelter-in-place orders. In fact, in response to COVID-19 fiscal impacts, in June of this year, the Council reduced expenditures by $10.5 million, decreased City staffing by 36 positions, accepted pay and benefit reductions from employee groups, and the City still faces long-term fiscal instability and an inability to meet the community’s service priorities and infrastructure maintenance needs.

"With Council direction, City staff performed extensive community outreach last year on the City’s fiscal challenges. In April of this year, the City commissioned independent scientifically valid public opinion research. The results of both the City staff outreach and the opinion research indicate that majorities of Concord residents are interested in extending and enhancing local revenue to maintain vital services with locally controlled funding that cannot be taken by the State, and that would continue to include accountability components.

"Therefore, the purpose of this report is to present to the City Council with the necessary information to consider placing a revenue measure before the voters on the November 2020 ballot. The measure -- referred to as the “Concord City Services Measure”1 would let voters decide whether to extend Measure Q at a one-cent rate until ended by voters as part of the actions the City takes to make resources available to invest in the City’s roadways and community’s priorities."