San Clemente Residents Face Vote on Utility Tax

When Proposition 218 passed in November, it eliminated San Clemente’s lucrative taxing district for landscaping and lighting, which paid for beach, park and street-light maintenance.

Because of a $1-million budget shortfall created by the mandates of Prop. 218, city officials have proposed a 2.5% utility tax, which goes before voters on Tuesday.

The tax on electric, water, sewer, natural gas and basic cable TV service would drop to 1.5% after five years and disappear altogether after another five years.

City Councilman Steve Apodaca said the city hopes to spur enough economic development that the city won’t need the tax by 2007.

“We wanted something that would be simple and easy for people to understand, and be as equitable as possible,” Apodaca said.

“We cut the fat a long time ago,” Apodaca added. “Now we’re into the meat, the muscle and the bone of the city infrastructure.”

But Jim Hill, a 13-year city resident who served on a citizens committee to find areas the city could cut expenses, said there’s yet more room to trim and no need for the utility tax.

“If [city officials] did their job, I’d be happy to pay any residual cost,” Hill said.

He said his committee found $1.4 million in potential savings that city officials ignored, including hiring a full-time city attorney instead of contracting out the work, and reducing management on city staff.

The City Council has drawn up an alternative budget in case the utility tax fails.

It would save $1 million by closing the softball fields at Richard T. Steed Memorial Park, eliminating local police dispatching and raising fees at the municipal golf course.

Hill said putting the issue to a vote is a “cop-out. We have representative government, and they’re supposed to represent us, the citizens.”

But people on both sides of the issue at least agree on one thing: Regardless of how they feel about the tax, all residents should turn out at the polls.

“I’m not concerned about what side they vote on,” Hill said, but “they must vote. It’s their duty and their responsibility.”