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With a taxpayer revolt mounting, Mayor Tom Bates is trying to shore up voter support for three proposed tax hikes, arguing that Berkeley has been a model of fiscal discipline during its prolonged budget crisis. 

“People have a perception of Berkeley not being a financially sound city. That is not the case,” Bates told reporters gathered at a Tuesday press conference where he unveiled his fiscal recovery plan.  

The 19-page plan booklet gives an overview of the city’s effort to close a $33.3 million short fall from fiscal year 2003 through 2009.  

Among the city’s accomplishments so far, the plan lists: 

• Cutting $14.3 million in spending since fiscal year 2003. 

• Eliminating more than 100 city positions, nearly all of them already vacant. 

• Compelling city unions to agree to a one-time giveback of about 2.5 percent of their scheduled 2005 pay raises. 

• Maintaining a AA3 bond rating from Moody’s, which the mayor said is tops for any city Berkeley’s size. 

But the plan also presents voters with a stark choice this November. If they don’t back three tax hikes totaling $5.7 million dollars, school crossing guards would be eliminated, seven police officer positions would go unfilled, a fire truck would be taken out of service during winter, and programs that help youth, seniors and the homeless would all be slashed. 

“We want the people to understand what’s at risk if they don’t pass the taxes,” said Bates, who was joined at the Tuesday press conference by councilmembers Linda Maio and Miriam Hawley. The plan is essentially a summary of the City Council’s budget debate last spring and offers no new policies that would require council approval. 

To tackle an estimated $15.7 million in deficits still remaining through fiscal year 2009, the plan calls for a combination of $6.1 million spending cuts, $5.7 million in tax increases and about $500,000 in general fund reserves. Additionally, the plan projects the city will reap $3.4 million in economic growth, based on city and county forecasts. In total, spending cuts would account for 61 percent of the recovery plan, while new taxes would amount to just 17 percent. 

But tax hike opponents were quick to dismiss the plan as political propaganda, rife with scare tactics that underlined core political problems at City Hall. 

“I call it the ‘political crisis recovery plan,’” said District 5 city council candidate Barbara Gilbert. “The purpose is to shore up support for the tax measures and their chosen candidates.” 

Michael Wilson, spokesperson for the newly formed Berkeleyans Against Soaring Taxes (BASTA), an alliance of neighborhood groups, criticized the mayor for creating a series of false choices for taxpayers. 

“There has been no effort to prioritize city services,” he said. “The city can find money elsewhere without cutting programs for children.” 

Also galling to Wilson was that city tax dollars went to pay for the booklet, which he maintained was essentially a pamphlet supporting the tax increases that should have been paid with private funds. 

“Voters need look no further for an example of wasteful spending than the mayor’s plan printed at taxpayer expense,” he said. 

Cisco DeVries, the mayor’s chief of staff, said the booklets will not be mailed to residents and the only costs incurred were photocopying pages and staff time. An official campaign kick-off in support of the tax measures is scheduled for Saturday. 

The mayor is pushing hard for three taxes on the November ballot:  

• A 1.5 percent increase in the Utility Users Tax that would raise $2.7 million for the general fund and expire in four years, 

• A one-half percent increase in the property transfer tax, set to expire in six years, for properties that sold for over $600,000 that would raise $2.2 million for youth services, 

• A $1.2 million increase in the Emergency Medical Services tax. 

Also on the ballot is an increase to the library tax that would cost the average homeowner $41 a year and a schools tax that would cost $185 a year. In all, if voters approved all five measures, the average homeowner’s tax bill would increase by about $300. 

Historically that likely wouldn’t have been too much to ask of Berkeley voters, but the tide against taxes has begun to turn. After Berkeley voters approved five out of six new spending measures in 2000, they rejected three out of four in 2002. And last year a revolt led by neighborhood groups forced the city to withdraw a proposed $7.5 million parcel tax scheduled for the March ballot. 

Data released by the city this spring showed that last year the average Berkeley homeowners shelled out about $4,128 in local taxes and assessments compared to $4,008 in Albany and $3,703 in Oakland. The primary difference was that, for voter-approved special taxes, Berkeley charged a rate based on the property’s assessed value, while Albany and Oakland charged a flat fee per parcel. 

Instead of asking taxpayers to dig deeper, tax opponents want the city to squeeze money out of nonprofits and UC Berkeley which are exempt from city assessments, and to renegotiate labor deals that gave city unions substantial raises and committed Berkeley, unlike many other California cities, to pay their employees’ full pension contributions to the California Public Employee Retirement System (CALPERS). 

The city’s contributions to CALPERS have skyrocketed 136 percent from 5.8 million in 2003 to $13.7 million this year. For the coming fiscal year CALPERS rate increases have already gone up $1 million, contributing to a rise in the projected budget deficit from $6 million to $7.5 million. 

Bates, however, maintained that reopening union contracts wasn’t realistic and that he was confident that if voters passed the taxes this year, the city could return to firm fiscal footing while still paying for employee pension benefits. 

“We have a solid plan in place,” he said. “We’re not going to keep coming out asking people to bail us out.”