A transit-focused sales tax initiative would help fund numerous projects, including a rail connector to the airport, a trolley from South County to Kearny Mesa and improvements to the north coastal rail corridor threatened by collapsing bluffs in Del Mar.
But the initiative makes clear early on in its text one thing it won’t do: “The measure will not impose a tax or fee on drivers, developers, or others based on vehicle miles traveled . . .”
The inclusion of that provision speaks to the public hostility toward a mileage tax, and the political potency opposition to one can have. It really has nothing to do with the substance of the half-cent sales tax proposal, but it sends a message.
The language stems from something of a case of mistaken identity.
When the countywide sales tax initiative was launched a few years ago, there was a raging battle over a mileage tax being included in the long-range regional transportation plan drafted by the San Diego Association of Governments.
Eventually, the controversial levy was dropped from the plan under bipartisan pressure from SANDAG board .
Around the same time, a coalition of labor and environmental groups was circulating petitions to put a half-cent sales tax on the November 2022 ballot to help fund the SANDAG plan. Signature-gatherers faced questions from voters about whether their measure would enact a mileage tax.
“There was some confusion when we first introduced this initiative,” said Gretchen Newsom, a labor leader and spokesperson for the coalition behind what is formally known as the San Diego County Improvement Measure for Traffic, Infrastructure, and Safety Ordinance.
Newsom said the coalition had to tell people concerned about a mileage tax “this is not that.”
Signatures came up short to qualify that sales tax measure for the ballot. Newsom said she believes the confusion and the coronavirus pandemic played a role in that outcome.
But the coalition started anew and last week the San Diego County Registrar of Voters announced virtually the same initiative has qualified for the ballot in November.
Because it’s a citizen’s initiative, approval requires a majority vote. If the SANDAG board put a tax on the ballot, that would require two-thirds majority approval. The SANDAG $160 billion plan designed to unfold over four decades would need multiple tax increases.
However, the plan almost certainly will change over time, perhaps significantly, given it was shaped by former SANDAG CEO Hasan Ikhrata, who left the agency in December after a turbulent five-year tenure.
While proponents of the measure can point to the initiative language to defend against future confusion — unintentional or not — they are more focused on promoting what it does rather than what it doesn’t do.
Half the money raised by the tax would go to the aforementioned projects, along with expansions and upgrades of rapid trolley and bus routes and transit connections.
Twenty-seven percent of the funding would go toward capital projects to improve road and highway “traffic flow and commuter safety.”
Specifically mentioned are fire evacuation routes on state Route 67 and other roads in fire-prone areas, bridge repairs, and maintenance and improvements to state Routes 56, 76, 78, 94, 125 and Interstates 5, 8, 15, 805, among other things.
Twelve percent would go for operations and maintenance at the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System and North County Transit District, while 7 percent would go for local roads across the region.
The initiative calls for funds to be spent in every city and in unincorporated areas across the county. The measure also promises discounted or free fares for seniors, youth, disabled and veterans.
The proposal caps spending on “general istrative services” at 2 percent. Though the money and projects would be istered by SANDAG, the initiative requires the San Diego County Board of Supervisors to appoint an oversight committee.
The measure specifies that must include people with expertise in land use, finance and engineering along with someone with chief executive experience, a union representative and a person from the “environmental justice community who is a frequent of the San Diego County transit system.”
All that is intended to boost taxpayer confidence that the money will be properly spent. After all, SANDAG has been under fire for mismanaging operations and some key projects, most recently the South Bay Expressway toll road.
Before Ikhrata, the Voice of San Diego reported in 2016 that SANDAG overstated how much money was available for highway projects from a previous tax increase as well as the amount that would be raised by a half-cent sales tax increase the agency put on the ballot in November of that year.
Despite those revelations, 58 percent of county voters still backed the tax measure, a strong majority but short of the two-thirds needed for approval. Years earlier, county voters twice approved of TransNet sales taxes for transportation.
Internal polls show the top-line transit projects targeted by the latest initiative are popular, according to Newsom.
“They are definitely part of the marquee selling points of this initiative. This is what the public wants,” Newsom said.
She was quick to add, “They also, frankly, want the roads fixed,”
The priority of transit over highways and roads is a sore point for mostly Republican critics of the long-range transportation plan and the ballot measure. Coronado Mayor Richard Bailey has been among the most outspoken, along with some leaders in North and East County cities.
The roads vs. transit dispute no doubt will figure into the campaign, but general opposition to taxes may be the overarching theme for opponents. Conservative talk show host and Assembly candidate Carl DeMaio, a driving force against the mileage tax, has weighed in against the initiative.
So has civil rights activist Shane Harris, who broke with progressives, saying the tax would further burden people “paying overpriced rent, facing tremendous odds at the pump, barely able to afford medicine and struggling to buy groceries. . .”
“I’m not against tax increases, I’m against the timing,” Harris said on social media. “Timing matters and this is not a good time.”
So far, there appears to be no organized opposition. Even if that emerges, it likely will be outgunned by labor, environmental and transportation groups, and much of San Diego’s Democratic political establishment that are lining up to back the measure.
The real political problem for the coalition may come from like-minded officials in the city of San Diego, including Mayor Todd Gloria. He and others are contemplating putting a 1 cent sales tax proposal to fund city operations on the November ballot.
That could be a lot for voters to swallow.
