Santa Rosa’s about-face on county road tax

Five months after sharply criticizing Sonoma County’s proposed road tax plan, Santa Rosa City Council members warmed to the idea Tuesday, embracing the quarter-cent sales tax as the best available solution to the city’s steadily deteriorating streets.

The council unanimously passed a resolution supporting the June ballot measure, which would raise an estimated ?$19.5 million annually for five years and which county supervisors have pledged to share equitably with its nine cities.

“There is no perfect way of doing this,” Councilman Tom Schwedhelm said. “(But) if we don’t invest now, it’s going to be catastrophic, in my opinion, going forward.”

How much Santa Rosa receives for road and transit projects won’t be determined until after the measure passes, a wrinkle that gave some council members significant pause. Largely because of that uncertainty, Councilman Gary Wysocky said he was only supporting the plan “grudgingly.”

A previous advisory measure suggested a formula that would steer 28 percent of the general sales tax revenue from the measure to the city, or $5.6 million, but that has been dropped from the ballot. Other allocation formulas the Board of Supervisors could adopt would bring the city between $4 million and $8 million per year.

Despite the uncertainty regarding Santa Rosa’s ultimate share of the tax, council members said there simply weren’t any other viable ways to pay for the upkeep of its 493 miles of roadway.

“I think we’ve absolutely got to do it,” Councilman Chris Coursey said. “We’ve got a ?$1 billion investment in roads in this city and we’re not taking care of them.”

When county officials first brought their plan to the city in November, council members groused about the city’s portion of the tax, questioned the decision to go with a general tax that needed a simple majority instead of a specific tax requiring two thirds approval, and criticized the county for what they called its poor communication with the city.

Since then, however, supervisors and county staff met with council members on several occasions to answer questions, explain the details of the measure and reassure them the money would be allocated equitably and with city input, 1st District Supervisor Susan Gorin said.

This commitment to communication, combined with the positive working relationship the city and county have forged over Sonoma Clean Power and the annexation of Roseland, have helped restore the trust needed to gain to the council’s support, said Gorin, the former mayor of Santa Rosa.

Councilwoman Julie Combs acknowledged the “rocky road” the city has had with the county in the past.

“There have been a number of times that we have not felt the mutual love that we would like to have,” she said.

She said the city was taking a risk in supporting a measure trusting that the supervisors would turn around and share it equitably. But she said the “improved relations” with the county of late gave her the confidence to back the plan.

Helping matters was the $22.6 million the county recently approved to fund upgrades to its roads over the next two years, including $3.9 million on major roads leading to and from the city, including Santa Rosa Avenue and Petaluma Hill, Sebastopol, Hall, Piner, Woolsey and Los Alamos roads.

Councilwoman Erin Carlstrom acknowledged the council’s tough questioning in November, telling county staff “we beat you up last time.” But she said she particularly appreciated that the county has committed to three road projects in Roseland, including West, Dutton and Corby avenues, knowing the city plans to annex the unincorporated area next year.

Santa Rosa is spending about $5.4 million annually maintaining its roads, far less than the $15 million it needs to, said Jason Nutt, the city’s new director of public works and transportation.

The city used to try to keep its Pavement Condition Index at 70, but that figure has dropped to 61, Nutt said. Anything under 49 is considered poor. A brand new road has an index of 100.

It was clear that if the measure passes, some Santa Rosa council members will be pressing the supervisors to adopt a formula that allocates more than the $5.4 million that would come to it using the Sonoma County Transportation Authority formula that weighs a community’s population and road miles equally.

If the formula were based on where sales tax is generated, the city would see $7.9 million annually. If based strictly on population, the city could expect $6.8 million. Basing it on vehicle miles traveled would net the city $6 million, while strictly basing it on road miles would leave the city with $4 million, according to an analysis.

You can reach Staff Writer Kevin McCallum at 521-5207 or kevin.mccallum@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @srcitybeat.