Sales tax passes easily, but there's hard work ahead

Mahoning County commissioners gambled when they put renewal of the county's 0.5 percent sales tax on the November ballot, and yesterday the voters of Mahoning County responded.
There were some people two months ago who were telling commissioners that the tax, which had been defeated in the first renewal attempt in May, couldn't be passed. Impose the tax, they counseled, and make it permanent. That, they said, was the only way to provide the county with the stable income that it needed.
While we agree that for long-range planning purposes a permanent tax would be best, an imposed tax would have certainly faced a referendum next November and almost certainly would have lost. The county would have traded 10 months of income for years of financial chaos.
That was a road commissioners chose not to take. The commissioners put their faith in the voters, and the voters reciprocated.
The most surprising aspect of Tuesday's election was the margin of victory. The renewal was approved with 60 percent of the vote, 52,498 for, 34,269 against.
No resting on laurels
But while that is a comfortable margin, it is not one on which the commissioners, other elected officials and county employees can rest. Based on the story in today's news pages, the commissioners seem to recognize that. We wonder about some of the others.
Basically, those who are entrusted with spending the county's money have two years in which to show more progress on reining in expenses. Some progress has already been made, but there is more work to be done.
The other half of the county's sales tax will be up for renewal in 2004, the same year that two of the three commissioners will be up for re-election.
If they can't convince county voters that they've done everything they can to get other elected officials to cooperate in cutting fat, if they can't show that the county is spending the taxpayers' money wisely, the renewal of that tax will be in jeopardy and the incumbents will face defeat.
This was not a particularly good year to have a tax issue on the ballot. The voters deserve credit for seeing the wisdom of renewing the tax and for allowing the county to maintain vital services.