February 2001
The Conejo Recreation & Park District is proposing that Property
Owners in the City pay for park improvement and maintenance with an additional
property tax assessment.
ENGINEERS
REPORT
Who could possibly oppose spending a mere $25 a year to save
our parks and recreation facilities from being overgrown with five foot high
weeds? And who wants to deny our kids the recreational opportunities they
deserve? I appreciate what the Conejo Recreation and Park District (CRPD)
workers have done over the years and believe the facilities and services they
provide are important to our community. But now they're having financial
problems and they and other districts in the State have come up with a clever
way to tap into a new source of funding that circumvents the Proposition 13
restrictions.
Still, the amount is so little, why not just vote "yes" and solve all
the problems? But before we all rush to put our stamp of approval on the
concept, let's take a closer look at the issues and some of the claims the
proponents make.
1. We're told that If citizens don't approve this measure, our Recreation
and Park system will be in dire straits.
These are scare tactics used repeatedly by governmental organizations to extract
more money from taxpayers. Somehow, the CRPD has survived for eight years since
the State redirected the recreation funds. The flier that the CRPD distributed
is a little misleading in describing just what the projected one million dollars
will actually accomplish. According to their spokesman, the projects planned by
the District would actually cost about $55 million. So this assessment is
actually a drop in the bucket and won't solve the basic problem of too little
money and too many planned expenditures. What will they do later when more funds
are needed? Go back to the well for another assessment?
2. They say The State took the money away and there's no way to get it
back.
Californians are among the highest taxed citizens in the country. Our State is
literally awash with money. If Sacramento unfairly redirected recreation monies,
then that's the problem our officials should address. They could join parks
officials throughout the State, form lobbying groups, work with elected State
officials and do all the things other interest groups do. If our CRPD officials
they've been unsuccessful in these efforts that's a reflection on them. They
instead chose the path of least resistance and turned to us, the taxpayers.
3. Supposedly this assessment will increase property values by making the
area more attractive to potential new residents.
Just what we need! How much higher do they want property values to go? We're
told that our area ranks fourth in the nation for recreation and parks
facilities and services. To really enhance the area perhaps more of an effort
should be made to acquire additional open space before it all gets built on.
Such investments don't require nearly the annual maintenance expenditures as
other recreation facilities.
4. All property owners will get to vote on the assessment.
Yes! And that also includes 852 "parcels" owned by local governmental
agencies plus large numbers owned by Amgen and other commercial entities that
are included under a complicated formula. With the historically low responses
associated with this type of balloting, these numbers could provide the
difference in a close vote. Letting officials vote for tax increases they
themselves propose and they themselves will not pay certainly strains the
credibility of the process.
5. Should the Recreation and Park operation really be a separate entity
and what is its track record?
The CRPD is an agency that is largely unaccountable to the public. I'll bet that
few Conejo Valley residents could name all the commissioners. This group was a
key player in the recent venture that spent million of dollars on the
fatally-flawed and ultimately aborted Hill Canyon Golf Course project. To date
no one has really explained that fiasco. Or how about all the money spent on the
dog park? What could the CRPD have done with all those funds? If the CRPD were a
Thousand Oaks city department, perhaps some additional accountability could be
introduced. It's inconceivable that some duplication couldn't be eliminated,
thus reducing operating expenses. We're told that for several reasons the CRPD
must be a separate agency, yet the City is continually funding CRPD projects and
many of their financial dealings are so intertwined that I doubt whether anyone
really understands them.
This measure is a band-aid approach. It won't do what is implied and will just
create a precedent for other agencies to use the same technique whenever they
need funding. In recent years we've had a public safety tax, a school bond tax,
a landscape and lighting tax and now this. The measure is being driven by fear
tactics and the now familiar appeal that it's "for the children."
We've been hearing that argument from Washington for years and frankly it's
getting old.
I plan to vote against the measure and urge others to do so. I suggest instead
that our officials renew their efforts to resolve the problem where it began,
and not on the backs of residents.
- - John Relle
This article was written by John Relle and published in the
March 2, 2001 Thousand Oaks Star and reprinted here with permission.
