Option tax on table for 5 candidates
Reprinted from The Gazette, Thursday, November 1, 2007, page 1B

By Rick Smith
The Gazette

CEDAR RAPIDS — Much of the talk around City Hall these days is about finding more money to run the place.

At a noon forum Wednesday, the six candidates running for the two district council seats on Tuesday's ballot provided few new ideas on how to pay the city's day to-day operating expenses.

But five of the six said they could support a 1 percent local option sales tax to raise money for special projects in the city.

Only westside District 4 challenger Chuck Wieneke reacted coolly to the option sales tax, saying he tended to be a fiscal conservative. He noted that the school districts in the county only this year began collecting their own 1 percent sales tax for school needs. Taking care of existing aged city infrastructure was more of a priority than new projects funded by a new tax, he said.

Wieneke, 63, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel and a retired Iowa Workforce Development supervisor who now works as a security supervisor, is running against incumbent Chuck Swore, 64, vice president of Acme Electric, and business owner Kathy Rickertsen, 59.

Also participating in Tuesday's forum at City Hall, sponsored by The Gazette, were east-side District 2 incumbent Sarah Henderson, 33, a marketing director; Robin Tucker, 43, businessman and Realtor; and businesswoman Monica Vernon, 50.

Most of the candidates indicated their support for a city local-option sales tax, which was in place for one year in recent years to build swimming pools, when asked about a suggestion made earlier by candidate Larry Sharp. Sharp, 68, a Realtor who is challenging in the race for the at-large seat on Tuesday's ballot, wants the city to seek approval from the Iowa Legislature to impose a small city income tax or "wheel" tax as a way to get those who work in the city and use its streets and services but live elsewhere to help pay the operating cost of city government.

The premise of such a tax is not so different from a local-option sales tax, which generates revenue from sales, including sales to those who shop here but live elsewhere.

Some of the candidates said the city needed to find new revenue sources, but none of them liked the idea of an income or wheel tax.

Henderson thought such a tax would drive employees and employers to other cities, where such a tax is not collected, and Vernon thought that the employer would get stuck paying the tax for its employees.

Five of the existing nine City Council members were supported by the Hawkeye Labor Council in the 2005 city election, and Swore in District 4 and Vernon in District 2 are this time. Gazette Editor Mark Bowden, who helped moderate Wednesday's forum, wondered if the candidates would be willing to make wage and benefit demands on city employees, two-thirds of whom are represented by labor unions, to help reduce city spending.

All but Swore said wages and benefits should be on the table for consideration like every other city expense.
 District 2 incumbent Henderson noted that most in District 2 contribute much more for their health care coverage than city employees, which she called "an inequity." "How can you say it's not on the table," Henderson said of the city's health insurance costs.

Swore said the city has reorganized employees, eliminated jobs and lowered the pay of some management employees who remain. He said he would not support "messing with" wages and benefits any further. Employees are entitled to cost-of-living increases, he said.

Wieneke, Tucker and Rickertsen said they decided to run for the council, in part, because of their opposition to the city exploration of selling a piece of the Twin Pines Golf Course to find money to renovate it. Most of the candidates offered little suggestion of where the money would come from to make the repairs. Some suggested the repairs could be put off.

Henderson said the city could figure out a way to make the one crucial fix: digging a well so the course could stop depending on city water for irrigation and other uses.

Swore, who first broached the concept of selling a golf course as a discussion point a year ago, noted that the city has gotten one offer, $2 million for just three acres of the course, that would pay for some or all the repairs.

Henderson and Vernon still said they were optimistic about the potential of commuter rail service between Cedar Rapids and Iowa City, though they and three of the other candidates agreed that trying more immediate commuter bus service between the two cities — an idea of at-large candidate P. Thomas Larson, 50, a test scorer and customer service representative — might be worth a try.

Wieneke said he'd need to see if anybody would use such a service first.