Two labor unions and a\u00a0child care\u00a0advocacy group on\u00a0Friday filed\u00a0a proposed countywide sales-tax hike\u00a0they\u2019ve dubbed the Protect San Diego County\u2019s Health & Safety Act\u00a0with the county Registrar of Voters\u00a0in hopes of making the November 2026 ballot.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The\u00a0proposed half-cent sales tax measure<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 which would raise a\u00a0projected\u00a0$360 million annually \u2013 aims to fund\u00a0health care,\u00a0child care, solutions to the Tijuana River sewage crisis and\u00a0public safety.\u00a0<\/p>\n The\u00a0Service Employees International Union Local 221,\u00a0child care\u00a0advocacy group Children First San Diego and Cal Fire Local 2881\u00a0expect to start collecting signatures next month.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re taking urgent action on the biggest health and safety threats San Diego County is facing \u2013 Tijuana River toxic sewage, strained 911 response, working families losing healthcare, childcare, and even the basic food they need to survive,\u201d\u00a0SEIU 221 President\u00a0Crystal Irving\u00a0wrote in a statement. \u201cOur coalition is determined to give voters the power to choose a safer, healthier future and starting soon we\u2019ll be out in every community gathering signatures and working with neighbors to protect San Diego County families.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Proposed ballot language submitted to the Registrar of Voters Friday\u00a0describes a slew of causes that proponents aim to support\u00a0with a half-cent sales-tax increase.\u00a0Up to 60 percent of funding\u00a0\u2013 the equivalent of $261 million annually \u2013\u00a0could back\u00a0child care\u00a0and health services for children, health\u00a0care for uninsured or underinsured\u00a0people,\u00a0food aid including staffing\u00a0for\u00a0CalFresh eligibility workers in the county, in-home\u00a0health services and affordable health care.\u00a0<\/p>\n Nearly 23 percent\u00a0\u2013 or roughly $81 million\u00a0annually\u00a0\u2013\u00a0would\u00a0go toward\u00a0combating\u00a0the Tijuana sewage crisis, with at least 20 percent\u00a0of this share of funds\u00a0directed toward infrastructure projects to \u201cstop sewage flows from Tijuana into the United States or through the Tijuana River Valley.\u201d\u00a0The measure says the funding could also address related health issues and protect local waters from pollution.\u00a0<\/p>\n Nearly 18 percent \u2013 or almost $63 million annually \u2013\u00a0could back public safety services, wildfire prevention\u00a0and crisis response.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Proponents also capped\u00a0administrative costs at 1.5 percent, or about $5 million annually.\u00a0<\/p>\n The proposed measure also calls for\u00a0an 11-member\u00a0citizens\u00a0oversight committee\u00a0to conduct annual audits\u00a0and\u00a0bars spending on politicians\u2019 salaries, lobbyist contracts or government office renovations.\u00a0<\/p>\n The citizen-backed effort is separate\u202ffrom the\u202fsubcommittee\u202fwork that county Board Chair Terra Lawson-Remer and Vice Chair Monica Montgomery Steppe\u202fare queuing up to hash out ways the county might bring in. The county faces\u00a0an\u00a0estimated $300 million annual budget hit<\/a>\u00a0tied to federal cuts.\u202fThe county is set to\u202fhire and pay consultants<\/a>\u202fup to $500,000\u202fas\u202fpart of that effort\u202fto conduct polling and research on potential measures to raise taxes and other\u202fpossible ways\u202fto increase\u00a0revenues\u00a0that may require\u00a0changes to other policies.\u00a0<\/p>\n In a Friday statement, Lawson-Remer\u00a0lauded\u00a0the proposed citizen measure.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis San Diego County Health & Safety\u00a0citizens\u00a0initiative offers a key tool that voters could choose to support in order to defend our community and our values: to keep our water clean, to keep our hospitals open, and to make sure firefighters and first responders have the resources they need when the next wildfire hits,\u201d Lawson-Remer wrote.\u00a0\u201cWhen Washington walks away, our community refuses to look the other way.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The decision to proceed with a citizens\u2019\u00a0measure doesn\u2019t\u00a0rule out a potential future measure pushed by county supervisors. Yet Lawson-Remer\u2019s quick endorsement shows\u00a0she\u2019s eager to see a citizens\u2019\u00a0group\u00a0push a measure forward that only\u00a0requires a simple majority for a ballot victory.\u00a0<\/p>\n The coalition\u00a0behind it\u00a0will face an uphill battle\u00a0to persuade skeptical voters already facing an avalanche of rising costs \u2013 and to get on the ballot in the first place.\u00a0<\/p>\n Courtney\u00a0Baltiyskyy\u00a0of\u00a0Children First San Diego\u00a0said the coalition\u00a0expects to hit the streets in January\u00a0to try to collect\u00a0at least 140,000 signatures. They\u2019ll need to deliver at least\u00a0102,923 valid signatures to get on next November\u2019s ballot.\u00a0<\/p>\n The county coalition also expects to have some competition next November.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The coalition\u00a0that includes\u00a0Laborers Local Union 89, Carpenters Union Local 619, and Rebuild SoCal\u00a0are rallying behind a one-cent sales tax hike for city of San Diego\u00a0for infrastructure repairs, wildfire prevention, pipe repairs for clean water and more.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Both coalitions have recently\u00a0circulated polls testing voters\u2019\u00a0appetite\u00a0for separate city and county measures\u00a0and shared some intel.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Their intel-sharing\u00a0follows the November 2024 demise of Measures E and G, separate\u00a0city\u00a0and countywide sales-tax proposals. San Diego politicos are skeptical voters would support two sales-tax hikes.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The results of an initial poll of city voters conducted around Labor Day on the city measure suggested\u00a0both city and county measures\u00a0suggested\u00a0a challenging climate for\u00a0proposed tax increases.\u00a0<\/p>\n Results obtained by Voice of San Diego show 57 percent of the 776 voters polled said they thought the county was on the wrong track and 60 percent said the same of the city.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Baltiyskyy\u00a0said Friday\u00a0the countywide coalition believes\u00a0it has a path to victory \u2013 and that support for it will grow as voters and local organizations learn more.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two labor unions and a\u00a0child care\u00a0advocacy group on\u00a0Friday filed\u00a0a proposed countywide sales-tax hike\u00a0they\u2019ve dubbed the Protect San Diego…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93025,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[51197,51198,51199,74,76,75,45435],"class_list":{"0":"post-93024","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-border-sewage","9":"tag-cal-fire-local-2881","10":"tag-children-first-san-diego","11":"tag-san-diego","12":"tag-san-diego-headlines","13":"tag-san-diego-news","14":"tag-seiu"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93024"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93024\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93025"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}