In a special meeting called to decide which members of the council should write a rebuttal to an argument against their proposed 1.5 percent sales tax on the November ballot, council member Dean Grose refused several opportunities to say he will support the tax but says he did vote to place it on the ballot.
“Ideologically, I’m opposed to taxes,” said Grose, “but that doesn’t mean I don’t think its (proposed sales tax) passage is critical to the future of the city.”
“Dean, we’ve been talking about it for more than a year, you’ve got to have an opinion on it, do you support the tax, yes or no,” asked an exasperated Mayor Richard D. Murphy? “I don’t think I’m asking too much. It’s time to stand up,” he told Grose.
“I choose not to answer,” said Grose.
“Dean, it was a yes or no question. You’re being unfair to all of us,” said a frustrated Mayor Pro-Tem Mark Chirco.
Only four of the five council members signed an argument drafted by Chirco and council member Shelley Hasselbrink for the tax. Grose has refused to sign it, citing deadlines and arguments at the meeting about inaccuracies and invalid assumptions contained therein.
“Dean, you’re putting us in a terrible position, we went over every word in that document, what is inaccurate?
“Yes,” echoed Hasselbrink, saying they went over the document “word by word.”
While saying he recognized the “critical nature” of the proposed sales tax, Grose said he preferred not to engage in a public argument citing what he believe the inaccurate assumptions were in the argument put forward by the city. “It’s not beneficial” to do that, he said.
While Grose said he understood the measure “needs to pass,” he refused several attempts to commit to supporting it. “I don’t want to get involved in doing that at this point,” he said.
“You have to be for or against it,” said Hasselbrink, “you can’t be in the middle of the road.”
“My opinion really doesn’t matter,” said Grose, adding that he voted to place the measure on the November ballot. Many times, in many ways Grose tried to say he understood that passing the tax was critical for the city but would not commit to support it.
The Council was discussing which members would issue a rebuttal to a letter from Phil Silverthorn, who noted he is a 25-year Los Alamitos resident. Silverthorn’s letter claims that “a sales tax is not what Los Alamitos needs right now.”
The opposing argument, which will now become part of the package received by voters, does not claim the tax is not needed, but moreso claims with high unemployment and businesses in distress, “this is the worse time to discuss a tax increase.”
Silverthorn’s argument suggests voting no on the tax, then using city reserves to survive, and bringing the sales tax measure back to voters in 2022.
City officials warn by 2022, deficits will be more than $3 million annually. They say the city is already running at a financial pace that is “unsustainable.”
Privately, city officials are also concerned that by waiting until 2022 could exhaust a significant amount of its reserves and could elevate its overall financial crisis to a very dangerous level.
Hasselbrink said “I’ll throw my neck on the line, put away my personal views and write the rebuttal.” Chiro said he would help her write the rebuttal to Silverhorn’s argument. “I totally agree that this (passage of a sales tax) is critical for our city.”
The council then agreed to allow Hasselbrink and Chirco to write the rebuttal to the opposition view and the measure will go to the polls with its argument strongly in favor of restoring fiscal sustainability to the city with four council signatures and not five.
