CC Minutes - 04/19/05 JEO - Laserfiche WebLink

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asking citizens to approve a tax base by putting it on the ballot, there was no need for a plan amendment. He noted in 1982 tax bases grew by six percent. He commented it was a different financial environment than now. With regard to Measure 5, Van Vactor said it imposed the $15 cap on property taxes, $10 to general government and $5 to schools. He said with Measure 5 they could still have increased the tax base. He noted in 1996 Measure 47 changed things and in 1997 the legislature put out to the citizens a measure addressing the issue in Ballot Measure 47, called Ballot Measure 50. He said that passed and that is now the main architecture of the property tax system today. He noted that act had the effect of reducing all assessed valuation on a statewide average by 17%. He said it capped the property tax growth at 3%, plus new construction and instituted no legal way for Lane County to increase its permanent tax rate. He stated they are stuck forever at $1.27 per thousand. He noted that Lane County is 35 of 36 counties for low tax rates. He indicated costs for Lane County are around six percent and it is hard to control costs at six percent with revenue around three percent. He explained that every year they have to reduce services in order to keep their budget balanced. He added they had done that the past three years by containing costs and reducing services. He said they face the future of continuing to erode the services. Van Vactor distributed a revised charter for Fiscal Year 04/05 (copy in file) of the taxes and the rates and where Lane County ranks among counties. He said that Lane County is proposing an ORS. 451 County Service District. He explained that the Board of County Commissioners would remain in charge and there would be no new governing body or layer of government to coordinate the service delivery systems. Van Vactor indicated they wanted to go with a district instead of a local option levy because with a district, if approved by the voters, the rate is permanent. He believed that public safety is a core service of government and has an expensive infrastructure and shouldn't be subject to the risk every four years of the citizens not approving the renewal and the loss of the core service. He added that local option levies are more subject to compression and it would be a less stable option. Van Vactor described developing the Public Safety District with three major hurdles: getting the Metro Plan Amendment, the Boundary Commission process that involves getting the resolutions of support from all 12 cities, and the vote of the citizens in November 2006. He said if the Metro Plan were approved, they would be coming back with resolutions of support from each city. He said they could determine what the rate would be and how each city would be affected by compression and how they could make the proposal work for Lane County, Eugene and Springfield. He indicated the goal with all 12 cities is a win-win for all of the jurisdictions. He said they drafted this in a narrow fashion and it didn't touch on any of the other policies. Bettman noted the County sponsored a bill, HB3301 in the State Legislature that would enable special districts by removing the prohibition on overlapping districts, meaning that it could take in the City of Eugene. She added there was a provision in that bill that was Page 3 - Joint Elected Officials Meeting - 7:00 p.m. - April 19, 2005 WD bc/m/05043/m