Commissioner Murman quoted in this Tampa Bay Times article on transportation:
Hillsborough administrator says sales tax ‘the only way’ to pay for transportation needs
Thursday, June 2, 2016 8:04pm
TAMPA — There was no indication Thursday that Hillsborough County commissioners are any closer to a consensus on how to pay for much-needed road work and transit projects.
But one thing was clear: If commissioners settle on anything other than a sales tax hike, it will be over the objections of County Administrator Mike Merrill.
A week before commissioners will once again consider sending voters a referendum to raise the sales tax by a half cent for transportation, an insistent and exasperated Merrill took aim at critics of the county’s plan and at alternative proposals he said won’t do the job.
At one point, Commissioner Sandy Murman told Merrill she’s heard concerns that the county’s plan is a list of projects that don’t factor in future technological advancements or upcoming transit studies.
“That’s what I’m hearing now is vision, connectivity, where’s the transit?” she said.
Merrill replied: “For someone to say that they don’t know there’s a plan and there isn’t specificity means that they haven’t been paying attention.
“We’ve made specific connections between points of job centers and communities in that plan. We’ve identified specific fixed guideways. We priced it out. It’s expensive.”
He added: “It takes time to build. That’s why the sales tax turns out to be the only way to pay for it if that’s what we want.”
Merrill took issue with one new idea gaining traction among some commissioners and the anti-tax community: Creating a tax-increment finance district, or TIF, throughout the county.
In a traditional TIF, a locality will incentivize development in certain zones and then capture the growth in revenue to further improve that district. But under this proposal, the entire county would be a TIF district and all growth in revenue would be pledged to transportation.
The county couldn’t use that money to pay for other services and needs as the population grew. And if revenues plummet, as they did during the recession, then there goes the money needed for roads and buses.
That’s problematic, Merrill said, and look no further than Pasco County. In 2011, Pasco instituted a TIF as part of a means to pay for transportation expenses. But in recent years the county has had to raise the property tax rate to plug its other budget holes, he said.
“I’m sure somebody told them five years ago that it was a good idea to pay for transportation with a TIF,” Merrill said. “We can make that choice, but I think it’s our responsibility to let you know what the consequences are. It’s mortgaging our future.”
Pasco County Assistant Administrator Heather Grimes said the county “has continued to experience steady, strong growth over the past few years” since the TIF was enacted, and they expect an additional $2.5 million for transportation in 2017.
Further, she said, the rise in property taxes were to increase the pay of Pasco County Sheriff’s Office deputies “that have been leaving to work in Hillsborough County or the city of Tampa.”
Hillsborough County Commissioner Stacy White continued to advocate for a TIF as a way to funnel money to transportation without raising taxes. He said he believes it could raise $1 billion in 10 years, roughly the same as a sales tax.
“I think we should be prepared to have both options on the table June 9,” White said.
Merrill said he will bring details and an outside expert to lay out the merits of the proposal, but he will still oppose it.
“I wish there were a different way to do this,” Merrill said. “I’d love to have the last three years of my life back if I could’ve told you three years ago that there’s a better way to do this.”
Before making a decision next week, commissioners said they want more details on what specific projects would be eliminated if the duration of the sales tax surcharge was cut to 20, 15, 10 or even five years. A presentation from staffers demonstrated that anything less than a 15-year tax would remove transit entirely from the list of transportation projects.
Murman also wanted to hear similar breakdowns from the city of Tampa and the Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority and what they would do with their share of the taxes under all of those scenarios.
But Commissioner Kevin Beckner, who supported a sales tax hike of 20 and 30 years, said: “It’s not the plan that’s preventing us from moving forward. To be honest, I think it’s building political will.”
Contact Steve Contorno at scontorno@tampabay.com. Follow @scontorno.
