Santa Rosa will discuss advancing charter changes, tax renewal to ballot on Tuesday

The Santa Rosa City Council will discuss Tuesday several items that could appear on the November ballot, including a measure to increase council compensation and the renewal of a public safety tax.

Voters in 2004 approved the Public Safety and Violence Prevention Funding Measure, known as Measure O, to provide a dedicated funding stream for police, fire and prevention programs in Santa Rosa.

But the quarter-cent sales tax, which generates about $10 million annually, is set to expire in March 2025.

City Hall administrators recommend extending the tax for 20 years and leaving the allocations to police, fire and violence prevention programs unchanged. Police and fire services each receive 40% of the funding and the remaining 20% is allocated to prevention, though some council members and residents have indicated they’d like to change how much goes to each bucket.

The council also will discuss three proposed amendments to the city’s charter ― effectively its constitution ― to increase council pay, ratify district-based elections and update and modernize the document’s language.

Elected officials during a June 21 meeting indicated support for sending all three measures to the ballot and directed staff to draft ballot language and a resolution to call for the election, but council members couldn’t agree on details related to the pay question, including how much of a bump council members should receive.

Some council members favored moving forward with a committee’s recommendation to tie council pay to the area median income for a three-person household, which would provide a more than sixfold raise, while two council members wanted to see council members paid more.

Proposed charter changes

A committee of 21 Santa Rosa residents spent six months studying updates to the city charter, which must be approved by voters. Of the dozen topics the committee reviewed, they ultimately recommended that the council send three measures to the November ballot:

• Increasing council pay.
• Updating the charter to bring it into compliance with the city’s new district-based elections. If it fails it could be up to a judge to decide the future of the city’s election method.
• Several small changes to update the charter language and revisions to clarify certain city procedures, such as allowing the city manager to craft a two-year budget or more frequent amendments to the charter. This would appear as one comprehensive question on the ballot.

During the June 21 meeting, council members supported sending all three to the ballot. But while elected officials believe higher pay could attract more diverse and qualified candidates for public office and would more fairly reflect the hours put into the job, they were divided on how best to achieve more meaningful compensation.

Santa Rosa council members currently receive an $800 monthly stipend and the mayor receives $1,200 a month ― $ 9,600 and $14,400 annually, respectively ― plus health insurance and other benefits valued up to $33,700 per year.

Under the committee’s proposal, pay would be tied to the area median income, a figure set by federal housing officials and updated each year. The mayor would receive 100% of the median income for a three-person household, $101,500, and council members would receive two-thirds of that, or $66,990.

Mayor Chris Rogers, Vice Mayor Eddie Alvarez and Council member Tom Schwedhelm favored moving forward with the committee’s suggestion.

But council members Victoria Fleming and Natalie Rogers told staff they want to see council members and the mayor receive the same pay equal to 100% of the area median income. While two-thirds of the area median income represents a sizable increase, it’s still not enough to support a family in Sonoma County with rising costs of living, they said.

Rogers said she works three jobs to help provide for her family, but that’s not sustainable in the long run.

“I can only sustain that for so long before something has to give,” she told her colleagues, adding that if she doesn’t run for reelection she worries the low pay could be a hindrance to attracting diverse people to run.

The difference in pay also creates disparity between the six council members and the mayor and Fleming worried it could lead people to seek the position for the wrong reason. The committee recommended higher pay for the mayor because they considered it a full-time job.

“The mayor does do extra work but the mayor is a person amongst equals,” Fleming said. “It should be somebody that is well aware that they are a leader among their peers and, to that end, I think that having a disparity in pay between the mayor and the council members of $30,000 to $40,000 really makes the mayoral position one that’s not only more powerful but really set apart.”

Council member Dianna MacDonald said while she believes council members should be paid more, she favored tying council pay to the lowest-paid city employees ― about $33,000. She said she was uncomfortable with such a large jump and the potential fiscal impact to the city budget, especially as administrators project deficits in future years. Salary expenditures would increase by about $426,000 in the first year under the committee’s proposal, a small percentage of the city’s overall budget.

Council member John Sawyer, who previously said he supports smaller, gradual raises, was absent.

Council members on Tuesday will decide on a final amount.

Also still to be decided is when the new salaries would go into effect if the changes are adopted by voters.

Mayor Rogers has pushed for a measure that would exempt sitting council members from being eligible for the pay increases during their current terms though that would mean some members would be getting paid significantly more than their colleagues, while others suggested implementing the increase in 2024 after all council members have gone through reelection. Neither proposal gained support from a majority of the council.

Public safety funding

The council on Tuesday will also discuss the extension of Measure O.

The public safety tax pays for more than 25 police and fire positions, equipment and youth programs and family services.

Staff recommends expanding what programs can be funded under the measure to include funding for mental health support and prioritizing resources in new geographic areas, such as Roseland.

If approved, staff recommends funding the city’s inRESPONSE mental health team, which responds to nonviolent emergencies related to mental health, homelessness and substance use, through Measure O. That would help ensure the program, which is being paid through one-time dollars, continues operating beyond the current fiscal year and could help the police department grow the team.

The Police Department also proposes using money to increase community policing initiatives and open substations across the city, including one in Roseland that would be staffed by Spanish-speaking personnel.

The Fire Department would seek to put revenue toward wildfire prevention and preparedness programs, such as vegetation management, early fire alerts and evacuation planning.

Council members have said there’s broad community support for extending the tax but a renewal requires a two-thirds approval, a high bar especially amid high inflation and increased costs of everyday goods like gas and groceries.

Measure O could also go up against another proposed quarter-cent countywide sales tax to boost child care and children’s health care services. A coalition of civic groups lobbying for the child care measure has submitted collected signatures needed to qualify for the ballot to the Register of Voters Office ahead of the July 19 deadline.

Support at the ballot box for funding requests can be unpredictable. Voters in March 2020 rejected a countywide half-cent sales tax for fire protection and a 30-year extension of the quarter-cent sales tax for SMART, but supported that November a new countywide tax to fund mental health and homeless services and an extension of an existing tax to support road and highway upgrades.

A survey conducted by Bay Area firm Godbe Research of 668 residents who are likely to vote in November showed that about 70% of respondents supported renewing Measure O. The survey was conducted online and through phone interviews after June’s midterm primary election.

Respondents were most interested in seeing tax dollars spent on reducing fire risks, improving 911 response times and providing mental health counseling for youth and families.

Residents who attended several town halls hosted by the city also indicated overall support for the measure. Some residents said they wanted to see an increase in funding for violence prevention programs and others wanted to see money dedicated to support homeless services.

Staff recommends the council refer the renewal to the ballot this year so that there isn’t a gap in funding.

“Due to the fiscal impacts of current Measure O funds and a potential expiration of those funds, staff strongly recommends the placement of a ballot measure for this upcoming general election,” staff wrote in its report to the council. “While the measure may not expire until 2025, a ballot measure this year gives the voters the opportunity to weigh in well in advance of the pending expiration.”

If there isn’t council support to send the measure to the ballot this year, or voters fail to approve it, the city can try again in 2024.

You can reach Staff Writer Paulina Pineda at 707-521-5268 or paulina.pineda@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @paulinapineda22.