City Hopes to Carve Out Bigger Piece of Property Tax Share

As a way to boost revenue to its general fund over the long haul, the city plans to explore options for upping its share of property taxes, City Manager Steve Duran said.

The city will urge state legislature to increase the city’s cut of property tax from 3.34 percent to at least 7 percent, Duran said, as a first step.

Compared to other Contra Costa County cities, Hercules’ gets the lowest amount of its property taxes outside of San Pablo, which receives 1.95 percent, according to the county auditor-controller's office. Nearby cities El Cerrito, Martinez and Pinole receive 18.69, 14.89 and 8.72 percentage shares respectively.

Increasing Hercules’ property tax share to 7 percent would add $1 million in annual revenue to the city’s general fund. “If we had an (additional) million, we wouldn’t have had to lay off three police officers last week and we would have saved a couple of other jobs, too,” Duran said at Tuesday’s city council meeting.

Hercules gave layoff notices to three sworn police officers in early March. By April 2012, when the latest round of city employee layoffs take effect, Hercules will have reduced full time, non-police, staff by 50 percent since 2010. Sworn officers in Hercules will drop from 29 to 20 in April.

Recent staff reductions through layoffs and attrition were an attempt by the city to resolve a structural deficit estimated at $1.6 million. The city will work to trim that amount from its 2012-2013 budget, Duran said. It has also introduced revenue increasing measures, such as the property tax share increase. The city council also voted to place a half-cent sales tax measure on the June election ballot.

A budget planning workshop is scheduled for Thursday at 2 p.m.