Dublin City Council recently voted to not place the recently proposed new local tax on the November 2010 ballot. The Council provided direction to use a balance of cuts and a significant portion of the City’s “rainy day fund” to help balance the budget for next year. The Council will decide in 2012 whether or not to place a local tax measure on the ballot. “I am cautiously optimistic that after this fiscal year that the worst is behind us,” said Dublin Mayor Tim Sbranti. “If not, we will continue with targeted service reductions and utilization of the economic uncertainty reserve (made of 06-07 and 07-08 surpluses) for the next couple of years.”

If things don’t improve in two years the Council will consider a measure in 2012, but given the difficult times many of our own residents are facing, the Council decided that now was not a good time for a tax. “Hopefully things improve so we don’t have to make many more cuts beyond what has already been done, but either way there will not be any type of City tax on the ballot this November,” noted Mayor Sbranti.

The Council’s decision to hold off on a new local tax measure for 2010 came about a week after the Dublin Unified School District (DUSD) announced that it would be considering the placement of another parcel tax on the November 2010 ballot to help address their structural budget challenges. DUSD’s latest attempt to tax residents comes on the heels of the Measure L parcel tax that was approved by voters in 2008. Both Mayor Sbranti and Vice Mayor Hildenbrand are employees of DUSD. Councilmember Hart was part of the School Board that made the decision not to build the second high school in East Dublin. Councilmember Biddle was the Executive Director of Dublin Partners in Education (DPIE) before joining the Council in 2008. An analysis of the DUSD’s latest tax measure will be presented in a future article.