On Tuesday morning, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors voted to put two very similar measures on the February Presidential Primary ballot. Both involved increasing property taxes for Alameda County residents to help fund a new, expanded Oakland Children’s Hospital. Both were reluctantly approved by the Supervisors, even after one supervisor called one of the two measures “confusing,” and misleading.”
On Tuesday morning, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors voted to put two very similar measures on the February Presidential Primary ballot. Both involved increasing property taxes for Alameda County residents to help fund a new, expanded Oakland Children’s Hospital. Both were reluctantly approved by the Supervisors, even after one supervisor called one of the two measures “confusing,” and misleading.”
The first measure was initiated by Children’s Hospital, who, over the course of this year collected over 66,000 signatures to add a proposed $300 million measure to the ballot. The measure would fund the building of a new facility. A Children’s Hospital representative said that the current hospital doesn’t meet state seismic standards, which need to be met by 2013. The new hospital would probably not be built at the current site on Martin Luther King Jr. Way, because the site is too small.
According to the County Administrator’s Office, approval of the measure would result in property tax increases of $24 each year for residential property owners, $100 for medium-size commercial property and $250 for large commercial property. Low-income families and people 65 or older would be exempt. The tax would last for 30 years.
The taxes would go toward repaying a $300 million dollar loan that Children’s would need to fund the building of the new facility. Since Children’s Hospital collected enough signatures for this measure, the Board had a mandatory duty to approve it, effectively placing it on the February ballot, even though the measure was not embraced whole-heartedly by the Board.
Supervisor Keith Carson cooly voiced the Board’s main concern: “The Measure is not cost-neutral for Alameda County.”
In fact, according to a staff report issued by the county in September, the administrative expenditures of the measure would likely cost the county $19 million over its 30-year course. This money would come out of the county’s general fund.
Carson was also concerned that it would allow Children’s Hospital to “backdoor” public monies for its own purposes, potentially sending funds out of the area. He said that the measure was “confusing,” and that the petitioners misled residents.
Supervisor Scott Haggerty called the process of petitioning “somewhat ludicrous,” because he felt the signatures were collected fraudulently: “I saw them in front of Wal-Mart collecting signatures,” he said, “and they weren’t telling people the truth.”
He said that he had heard the petitioners telling people that the measure would “help the children,” and neglecting to tell them how much the measure would cost.
Haggerty also lamented that Children’s Hospital didn’t initially come to the Board to get their input.
The second, “alternative” ballot measure, which was put together by the Board of Supervisors and county staff, would also fund a new Children’s Hospital. According to the County Administrator’s Office, this competing measure attempts to lessen Alameda County’s administrative burden and also deletes provisions in the original measure that authorize the county to issue debt. The tax would last for 35 years. The Board of Supervisors embraced this measure, but not before giving themselves large pats on the back for developing it in response to the “confusing” measure put forth by Children’s Hospital.
“We didn’t take our anger and say ‘how do we fight it?’ Supervisor Carson commented, “we said, how do we sit down, despite the loss of confidence, and advance this for the purpose of providing healthcare to the children?”
Before the Supervisors convened on the issue, Children’s Hospital Vice President of Government Affairs Mary Dean quietly approved of the alternative measure.
Next February, each of the ballot measures will require a two-thirds majority of the voters to pass. If both measures do receive this majority, then the measure receiving the greatest number of votes would be adopted.
Supervisor Haggerty casually predicted later, “I am quite confident they will both fail.”