Contra Costa Taxpayers Association

BY TERESA CASAZZA

Special to The Bee

What should be done about the state Board of Equalization in response to the report that the tax agency misused revenue-generating staff and misallocated some sales tax revenue among different funds? Equally important, what shouldn’t be done?

The Legislature is poised to act and faces two options: Reform the agency as part of the usual policymaking process, with public hearings, or jam changes through the state budget process, without input from small business owners, consumers or others who will be most impacted.

Unfortunately, the latter approach seems to have support from key policymakers. Their goal appears to be to make drastic changes to the BOE – far beyond those needed to address the problems identified by the state’s evaluation – and spring the changes on rank-and-file legislators and the public at the last minute, roughly 72 hours before a vote.

THE LEGISLATURE HAS TWO OPTIONS: REFORM THE TAX BOARD AS PART OF THE USUAL, PUBLIC PROCESS OR JAM CHANGES THROUGH IN THE STATE BUDGET. WE PREFER THE MORE THOUGHTFUL APPROACH.

To accomplish this, the changes would be included in the state budget process, even though BOE reform is not truly a budget matter.

As the oldest and largest group representing taxpayers in the state, the California Taxpayers Association is calling for a more thoughtful approach. The BOE clearly needs to change the way it operates, but the changes must be made with full transparency.

Assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas, who chairs the Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee, has introduced reform legislation (Assembly Bill 1210) that takes the right approach. His bill outlines a framework for reforms to address problems identified in the Department of Finance’s evaluation while preserving core functions that protect taxpayers’ rights.

For example, we must safeguard the Taxpayers’ Bill of Rights, which itself is a 1988 reform that could be rolled back if the current reform effort isn’t carefully undertaken.

It also is worth noting that the BOE collects approximately one-third of the state’s annual tax revenue, has more than 4,000 employees and is responsible for such things as hearing tax appeals (in a setting that doesn’t require lawyers, and is accessible to taxpayers of all income levels) and making sure retailers don’t overcharge customers for sales tax.

Changes to an agency this important – to the state and taxpayers alike – should be made only after a thorough vetting, and should not be part of the notoriously hasty and politically charged budget process.

Yes, the state can and must improve transparency at the BOE. But transparency is never improved through backroom deal-making.

TERESA CASAZZA IS THE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER OF THE CALIFORNIA TAXPAYERS ASSOCIATION. SHE CAN BE REACHED AT CALTAX@CALTAX.ORG.

Unfunded Pensions - With the recent flood of newspaper articles and editorials on the state's unfunded public employee pension crisis, CoCoTax members are validated in our years-long campaign to bring attention to the issue.  Along with several county grand juries, we have reported the looming shortfall, and urged changes to correct the problem - mostly to no avail.  Even fiscally responsible local officials have often told us, "we have little control; it's a problem only the legislature can fix."  Nevertheless, our newly formed CoCoTax Pension Task Force has identified a number of measures that local jurisdictions may be able to employ effectively.  We'll begin rolling out those solutions shortly.  Admittedly, these actions will represent "nibbling at the edges," but are worth serious consideration.  More municipal bankruptcies, cuts in public services and even reductions in pensions are the likely future, unless elected officials and union leaders see the light and take action.  (Unfortunately, the "other shoe" of public fiscal bad news is just around the corner, when agencies will soon be required to report their unfunded employee health care debt, likely to rival pension debt in magnitude.)  

Potholes - While the pension issue belatedly now commands public attention, the flip side of the problem is seen (and felt) in the terrible condition of our roads, bridges and other components of our transportation infrastructure.  Potholes on major highways now cause serious accidents, and commuters suffer hours of daily congestion delay.  In order to divert funds for employee compensation and now to pay increased pension costs, Sacramento and virtually every public agency responsible for our roads have repeatedly deferred necessary maintenance.  AAA now estimates California drivers suffer $700 a year in vehicle damage attributable to poor roads. This cost is in addition to the newly passed gas tax and increased vehicle registration fees.  Yet, we are skeptical that the new funding will actually be used to improve our roads, but rather to a) fund the governor's legacy High Speed Rail fiasco, and b) pay for pensions.

Speed Bumps - We've all encountered the frustration of bumping our way over the asphalt obstacles deliberately placed in parking lots, ostensibly to force drivers to reduce their speed.  The presumption is that some will otherwise drive too fast, endangering pedestrians.  But, in reality, it only causes the scofflaws to drive faster between the bumps, negating the intended safety outcome.  To my philosophical mind, speed bumps represent a negative shift in our culture, where the freedom of all is burdened by a perceived need to protect us from those who will not be held accountable for their actions.  If grownups are shielded from the consequences of their bad acts, how are youngsters to learn the life lessons necessary for good citizenship?  Honesty and personal accountability - two critical elements of a traditionally virtuous American society - are undermined by participation trophies, plea deals, politicians who lie with impunity, and, yes - those darned speed bumps.

Jack Weir

(925) 899-4298 cell

Protest EBMUD Rate Increases to Water and Waste-Water Charges

EBMUD has proposed raising water rates by 9.25% in July and 9% next year.  They also propose to raise wastewater rates by 5% each year as well.

The proposed increases are outrageous.  Why, in this age of technological advancement and innovation are district consumer charges increasing?  Does the district not engage in exploration of technology that lowers costs?  

One suspects the real issue is steadily rising employee labor costs, to cover salaries and - more especially - rapidly rising benefit costs.

Further, EBMUD’s failure to acquire additional storage capacity over the years is inexcusable.  The district has always had access to population data which made clear that there would be need for significant additional storage resources, but the district's approach for the past decade has been passive.

Ratepayers should protest these proposed increases in the strongest possible terms.

Write before June 10 to:

EBMUD S-218

PO Box 24055

Oakland, CA 94623-1055

Jack Weir

(925) 899-4298 cell

For those that may not have read the prior articles on Regionalism, the movement is generally characterized by a shift from our local forms of government (cities and counties), led by our elected officials whom we can hold accountable for local decisions, to a system of regional governance, led by appointed officials that carry out regional priorities, regardless of local decisions.  These entities and officials have no electoral accountability.  Last June, 5 of the 9 Bay Area counties approved a parcel tax, Measure AA.  Contra Costa did not approve this, yet we’re obligated to pay it.  The dollars are small, but the point is that we now have an unelected regional body with the ability to put measures on our Contra Costa County ballot and implement a tax we did not approve.

The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) was created in 1970 by the State Legislature to coordinate transportation services across the Bay Area.  MTC is designated a regional transportation planning agency (RTPA) by the State of California and a metropolitan planning organization (MPO) by the federal government.  MTC administers state-provided money through the Transportation Development Act (TDA) and has decision-making authority over the State Transportation Improvement Program (STIP). MTC administers federal funding through various grant programs, including the Transportation for Livable Communities (TLC) Program, Low Income Flexible Transportation (LIFT) Program, and Innovative Climate Grants Program. MTC has overseen administration of toll revenue collected on the seven State-owned bridges in the Bay Area through the Bay Area Toll Authority (BATA) since 2005.

MTC has now evolved into an authority over several other agencies, including ABAG, and is responsible for a host of financial, open-space, insurance, land use, green business, energy, water, and hazmat training programs.  The MTC 16-member board is appointed by other agencies across the nine county Bay Area region.  We have no way of holding the members accountable for decisions that affect our county.  Remember the flap last year over the purchase of a $250 million office building using BART fare monies? That’s the new MTC headquarters building in San Francisco, which houses 9 other regional governance authorities we did not elect.  Through a financial ploy, MTC now has authority over ABAG, giving the organization unprecedented power over our lives.

The overall plan (for which you did not vote) for the nine-county region is contained in Plan Bay Area 2013.  The recently updated draft, Plan Bay Area 2040, is now in circulation for comment.  The plan outlines land use for “Primary Development Areas” (think mixed use, high-rise “stack and pack” housing facilities (with insufficient parking) growing up in our downtown areas and along transit lines.  The plan also outlines the designation of “Primary Conservation Areas” where development is not allowed. 

Read Plan Bay Area 2040 and let your local elected officials know what you think. The plan can be viewed at: http://www.planbayarea.org/ Check out more information at the Nine-County Coalition’s web site: http://nine-county-coalition.squarespace.com/ From the NCC web site: “There are times we must make extra efforts to be hear.  The continued proliferation of a phenomenon called "Regionalism" is one such time.  Therefore, a group of ordinary citizens from all political and professional bents and backgrounds formed Nine-County Coalition. The group's objective is a simple one:  present facts about the downsides and dangers of unfettered regionalism." 

The next Nine-County Coalition meeting is June 17, 2017. Call for directions.  

Dan B. Walden

Walden Consulting

walden156@gmail.com

Listen to the Walnut Creek City Council meeting video about the CalPERS Pension exposure for the City of Walnut Creek, including a review of the unfunded liability exposure, presented by staff and an actuary, and the options the actuary presented.  Click here to watch the video.

Click here to view Pension Contribution Ratios 2017 Update document.

Click to view Projected Public Agency Pension Contributions 2017 document.

I can’t tell you how discouraging it is to see the leadership of the Contra Costa Community College district taken over by leftist politicians.  With the death of long-time conservative trustee John Nejedly, and the retirement of Chancellor Helen Benjamin, the board seems intent on pulling the district into the abyss of partisan politics.

Our public education system is chartered to be non-partisan, for obvious reasons, but the California socialists, never a group to honor the law and the concepts of a free society, has now dragged the district into the “sanctuary” mess.

State Senator Kevin De Leon, the state Senate president pro tem (who commented recently that he has family members living here illegally) visited Diablo Valley College to tout Senate Bill 54, which would create a state-wide sanctuary for illegal aliens.  His visit occurred just two months after the board voted unanimously to establish sanctuary status for “undocumented students” on all three main and satellite campuses.

Adding partisan insult to injury, the leftist board will almost surely approve an extension of the trade union-initiated ”Project Stabilization Agreement” (formerly called Project Labor Agreement, as though changing the name would fool taxpayer advocates) which essentially prevents non-union contractors from bidding on taxpayer-funded school bond construction projects.  CoCoTax vigorously opposes PSA’s (or PLA’s) because a) they do not deliver on their promises of local hiring nor improved quality of workmanship, and b) they inevitably increase costs by 15-20% with no added value to taxpayers.  As union membership declines throughout the nation, unions use their political clout to lock up access to public construction funding.

With massive cuts in federal funding to California looming in the near-term, one would think elected officials would think twice before taking such foolish steps.  But, we know the left has never put such stock in rationality, nor shown concern for taxpayers' interests.

Recently, we introduced CoCoTax to a discussion forum called the Nine-County Coalition.  The NCC seeks to inform members of the Greater Bay Area Community about issues related to the increasing existence of regional governance authorities in our lives.  In our last article, the case was made that Regionalism is indeed an issue of concern for CoCoTax because:

• 1.       Appointed regional boards can reduce local land use decision-making authority and alter public expenditure priorities without the involvement of established governmental authorities (cities and counties.)
• 2.       Regional governance can raises taxes for expenditures not authorized by local voters (recent Measure AA.)
• 3.       Regional bodies can act on their own, reducing accountability for policy decisions affecting the electorate. 

The Nine-County Coalition met in September to exchange information and perspectives on issues in each of our counties – especially fall election measures.  Prominent in the discussions were basic principles that we might keep in mind when considering how we want to live and the role of government/governance in our lives.

These important principles of effective government include:

• 1.       We live in a representative democracy.  We directly elect others to represent us in creating laws and adopting regulations within which we agree to live.
• 2.       Our government is organized into city-county-state-national levels, so that issues are dealt with by directly-elected governing bodies closest to the people most affected.
• 3.       We define the issues important to our communities and our lives.  Through our vote, we elect individuals and approve measures intended to create the society in which we choose to live.  If we are not satisfied with our representatives, we can elect others or change the laws through referendum.

Consider, then, the “regional” measures placed on our ballots by the unelected regional authorities created by the California Legislature.  These measures can supersede the authority and discretion of our elected county government.  These “authorities” can place measures before voters across the Greater Bay Area that may not have been addressed by our own elected representatives, but which we are obliged to implement regardless of the Contra Costa County Electorate vote.  The recent Measure AA is such a measure.  Defeated in our county, Contra Costa County voters are still obligated to implement it, at taxpayer expense, despite our opposition.

How do we recognize the encroachment of the “Regionalism” form of governance into our system of local control government? 

• 1.       Look at the individual representatives in the organization’s controlling body.  Did you elect a representative to serve on the organization’s governing board, or were the board members appointed to their position to serve interests beyond what you elected them to do?
• 2.       Look for the scope of impact for the decisions made by the board.  Are the goals and objectives something that you’ve had an opportunity to address in a public forum, or were they created by other interests from outside your community and your established government organizations.
• 3.       Look for code words such as “sustainable” and “green.”  Are the policy choices made with an interest to serve the constituencies, balancing economic interests with other community priorities, or are judgements made to achieve goals set beyond the local constituents, regardless of the local economic cost-benefit analysis?
• 4.       Look for the words “planning” and “coordinating” as the primary responsibility of the new organization.  “Planning” and “coordinating” organizations have no accountability for results.  They are not focused on specific issues raised by the community, nor are they limited to a charter given by government authorities.  Their mission is usually to create a model future driven by ideology, rather than reality.

These points are directly visible in the largest regional authority in the nine Bay Area counties, Plan Bay Area.  According to its website, “Plan Bay Area is a long-range integrated transportation and land-use/housing strategy through 2040 for the San Francisco Bay Area.  On July 18, 2013, the Plan was jointly approved by the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) Executive Board and by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC).” 

The website goes on to say that “Plan Bay Area marks the nine-county region’s first long-range plan to meet the requirements of California’s landmark 2008 Senate Bill 375, which calls on each of the state’s 13 metropolitan areas to develop a Sustainable Communities Strategy to accommodate future population growth and reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cars and light trucks.”

Why is this of concern?  Plan Bay Area was not on our ballot, we have no mechanism to hold the “planners” accountable, and our participation is limited to periodic “community input” meetings.

The Nine-County Coalition meets again on Saturday, December 3, in Alameda.

At the July monthly board meeting of the Contra Costa Taxpayers Association (CoCoTax), the board voted to support the Contra Costa Transportation Authority (CCTA) proposal to increase and extend the transportation sales tax surcharge currently in effect.  This measure will appear on November ballots in Contra Costa.  Voters in the county have previously approved two such sales tax surcharges to fund needed transportation improvements such as the fourth bore of the Caldecott Tunnel, and other projects and maintenance programs.

The vote followed a vigorous discussion, which focused primarily on the inclusion in this measure of $300M to help finance the expansion of the BART fleet.  The county transportation authority has included language in the measure to ensure that the other two BART counties will contribute like amounts, and that BART and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) will also contribute substantial funds to pay for expanding the fleet and related train control system and station improvements.

BART is also proposing a $3.5 billion bond on the November ballot to finance fleet expansion and upgrade.  There was unanimous concern expressed by the board regarding BART’s management of taxpayers’ dollars and labor relations in particular.  CoCoTax will shortly take the BART measure up separately for evaluation and a vote on our position.