DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I DO
By Liz Altieri
Be prepared to reach into your wallets so your city employees don’t have to. The City of Emeryville ’s Finance Committee (Nora Davis, Chair; Jennifer West, Member) is currently contemplating “revenue enhancements” to recommend to the full City Council. This is due to the grim news revealed at last June’s City Council “Advance” (as opposed to “Retreat”) regarding budget projections for Fiscal 2009-10, which started on July 1: “The current revenue base is inadequate in sustaining our cost structures.” While some savings are expected from freezing open staff positions, the City Council is looking to new revenues to address this “fiscal imbalance” – more taxes.
The easy way out is a special “Landscape and Lighting Assessment District” (LLAD) which can be imposed on property taxpayers without going through a regular election. A simple mailing to property owners – residents and businesses in Emeryville – can result in new property taxes which are weighted by the number of square feet owned, and if you don’t respond to the mailing, your vote doesn’t count. Twenty commercial property owners (count them: Wareham , Madison Marquette ( Bay Street ), Pixar, etc.) can sway this vote. Hey, do any of these people have projects pending before the City? Can you hear “Let’s Make a Deal” in any of these back rooms at City Hall? And who will really pay this tax? Their tenants, that's who - other Emeryville small businesses AND their customers.
You may have recently received a telephone poll, which was commissioned and paid for by the City, to find out how taxpayers would react to this new tax. Couched in vague terms relating to “quality of life” issues, the bare facts of a new tax are veiled by threats of unmaintained parks and dim street lights. No where mentioned is the alternative of cutting city employee costs – which currently consume 72% of the General Fund.
Government employees, including Emeryville workers, have some of the most lucrative jobs around. Paid medical, dental and vision benefits, 37.5 hours work weeks, liberal vacation and “administrative” pay, car allowances (where, in our "Green" City?), retirement at 55 with almost full salaries – we are not talking fire and police here, but your average pencil pusher at City Hall. With state and local governments across California requiring closures of government offices and unpaid furloughs from employees, has Emeryville even contemplated further tightening its own belt before stretching out its palms for taxpayer silver? No way. Embittered employees might take a walk – to where, Vallejo ? Hey, can I apply for that job?
It is time to demand that Emeryville government look around its own house for ways to save money before grabbing at the public to continue financing its employees’ extravagant salary and benefits packages. We’re not going to take it any more. Contact your City Council members before it’s too late.
Liz Altieri and her husband have lived in Emeryville for the past seven years, and own their Watergate residence. Liz has worked in Emeryville since 1997. She is currently studying for her real estate license and working with All Emeryville Properties as a broker's assistant. Liz is an emeritus Board member of the Emeryville Chamber of Commerce, and has been a member of the General Plan Steering Committee since its inception.
