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Talk in terms of voters’ interests to pass sales tax, officials urge
YOUNGSTOWN
Mahoning County officials said the key to building voter support for the sales tax that will appear on the Nov. 4 ballot is to talk in terms of the continued benefits voters will receive from its passage.
“The bottom line of these taxpayers is: Why do I want to pay this sales tax?” said Carol McFall, chief deputy county auditor.
The answers to the question: “What do we do to help these taxpayers?” needs to be the campaign focus, she said.
“Which just basically goes back, Carol, to the services that each department provides, whether it’s criminal justice or the auditor,” replied county Prosecutor Paul J. Gains.
The discussion of the sales-tax campaign strategy occurred in a Thursday county commissioners’ staff meeting.
The meeting was in advance of public hearings on the sales tax, which will be at 5:30 p.m. Thursday at the Covelli Centre in downtown Youngstown, and at 6 p.m. June 30 at McMahon Hall at the Mill Creek MetroParks Farm in Canfield.
Those attending the hearings will find two options on the table.
Both would renew an existing half-percent sales tax for five years and add a quarter-percent sales tax of the same duration.
Either option would raise about $24 million annually.
One of the options, however, would restrict the money’s use to the sheriff’s, coroner’s, and prosecutor’s offices and the 911 emergency dispatching center.
The other option would allow unrestricted use of the money in the county’s general fund, which is its main operating fund.
“You have to inform the people: What is your purpose? What do you do, and what will I lose” if the tax fails, said Commissioner Carol Rimedio-Righetti.
“You may become the victim of a crime where we want to be able to house [in the county jail] the person that committed the offense against you; and the county jail acts as the jail for every political subdivision in the county,” Gains added.
“That’s the message that has to get out to the public: Do you want a jail? Because, if you want a jail and you want to keep crime down, then you’ve got to pay for it,” said Linette Stratford, chief of the civil division in the county prosecutor’s office.
“Unfortunately, we’ve got to go back for an increase in the sales tax,” Gains said, adding that the need for an increase is “based upon the actions of Columbus in cutting the local government funds” that come from the state to the county.
The campaign must emphasize the tax will have a duration of five years, and county officials will report regularly to the voters on how the money is spent, Righetti said.
The voters narrowly defeated a continuous renewal of the half-percent sales tax that was on the May 6 ballot and that will expire Sept. 30, 2015.
The county has another half-percent sales tax the voters made continuous in May 2007.
Each of the current half-percent sales taxes generates about $16 million a year, for a total of about $32 million.
The county’s general-fund budget for this year totals $54.1 million, including nearly $2.6 million carried over from 2013 into 2014.