Click here for a complete list of our election recommendations.
Albany voters should not be fooled by the City Council’s confusing measure that would more than double the supplemental taxes that are ostensibly for ambulance and fire protection services.
Measure K is not just a merger of two existing taxes into a single new one, as the ballot summary and City Attorney Malathy Subramanian’s “impartial” analysis of the measure deceptively suggest. This is a permanent tax increase for owners of detached single-family homes — and for most, it’s more than twice as much as they’re currently paying.
Voters should reject Measure K.
Albany residents already pay for a long list of supplemental property taxes. If city leaders want another tax hike, they should be transparent about the amount, who will bear the cost, and the use of the money. Instead, the city attorney and City Council proponents of Measure K hide key details, making the measure look more innocuous than it is.
The existing two taxes currently bring in a total of about $900,000 a year for emergency medical services and paramedic life support fire engines. The new one under Measure K would bring in $1.95 million the first year.
The additional revenue won’t all be spent as billed. While about half the new money would go for additional firefighters, the other half would go for EMS services currently generally covered by the general fund. Thus about half the new money would be an indirect subsidy to the general fund, which could be spent for any legal government purpose.
That’s not revealed in the official ballot information. Nor is the tax effect on owners of detached single-family houses.
The existing two taxes are flat amounts charged to each property and will, next year after adjustments for inflation, total about $123 a year. Under Measure K, instead of the two flat taxes, property owners would pay a single new tax based on the square footage of the land — not the size of the structure but the size of the parcel.
The rate of the new tax would start next year at 7.4 cents per square foot. Doing the math, any property owner with a parcel larger than about 1,660 square feet would pay more under Measure K. That’s essentially every owner of a detached single-family house in the city.
Some 98% of Albany single-family lots are at least 2,500 square feet. Under Measure K, that size property would be taxed $185 the first year. That’s $62, or 50%, more than under the two existing taxes.
Nearly two-thirds of Albany single-family lots are at least 3,750 square feet. Under Measure K, that size property would be taxed $278 the first year. That’s $154, or 2.3 times, more than under the two existing taxes.
When council members Preston Jordan, Peggy McQuaid and Ge’Nell Gary claim in ballot arguments that Measure K increases the average tax by just $52 per year per residence, they don’t mention that their average includes condominiums and apartments. And their implication that mainly commercial properties will bear the brunt of the tax increase is disingenuous, ignoring the effect on owners of detached single-family homes.
Making matters worse, Measure K, which increases each year for inflation, has no expiration date. Voters should have a chance to periodically review supplemental taxes to ensure that the money is being spent well and is still needed.
Albany property owners already pay about $600 a year for separate city parcel taxes for things such as libraries, sidewalks, road paving and street lighting. In addition, homeowners pay roughly that amount to help cover the cost of public employee pensions and bonds for fire and seismic safety and city recreational facilities. And when they go to sell, property owners and their buyers pay one of the state’s highest transfer taxes.
There are too many problems with Measure K: the lack of transparency about the doubling of the tax, the failure to reveal the big hit on owners of detached single-family homes, the lack of a sunset date, the indirect subsidy to the general fund, and the piling on to an already long list of Albany property taxes.
Voters should reject Measure K.
Join the Conversation
We invite you to use our commenting platform to engage in insightful conversations about issues in our community. We reserve the right at all times to remove any information or materials that are unlawful, threatening, abusive, libelous, defamatory, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable to us, and to disclose any information necessary to satisfy the law, regulation, or government request. We might permanently block any user who abuses these conditions.