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[Since the departures of Larry Gilbert and Geoff Willis, this blog has been trying to get more conservative voices. With this post we are proud to present our newest conservative blogger, Fullerton's Ryan Cantor.]
Good government is not the same thing as smaller government. If you’re a conservative like me, you’ve been lied to for several decades. Good government tramples on the rights of individuals as little as possible. When it does trample on our rights, it does so with due process and for the greater moral good and freedom of the community that consents to being governed. More often than not, smaller government tends to trample less than bigger government, but remember this country was founded on the basis that a king (an individual—the smallest government possible) regularly trampled on the rights of individuals.
I bring this up in the context of the water tax because the city council in Fullerton is using what it perceives to be righting a moral wrong to trample on my rights. This is bad (small) government and we’re not asking the right questions to determine the best way out of the conundrum that we find ourselves due to years of inaction by the city council.
One of my favorite quotes from the June recall campaign came from Sean Paden. Commenting on the Water Tax at a candidate forum, Sean broke his stance into a very simple statement: “When you take something that isn’t yours, you give it back.”
Great line. Easy to understand, it brought be back to my youth (which is a very effective way to appeal to voters), and it makes sense on its face. Here’s the problem.
I didn’t take anyone’s money, yet I’m being forced to provide restitution. On top of that, I’m being forced to provide restitution to individuals who no longer live or vote in Fullerton.
That ain’t right. For those of you with short attention spans, here’s my own one-liner that summarizes what the rest of the post covers: Unless you’re the King of Fullerton, you’re getting cuckolded by the refund.
If you subscribe to the belief that the city’s collection of a franchise fee was a moral wrong, that it was illegal, and the citizens who were wronged ought to be compensated by the city — then it’s very difficult to fit a three-year statute of limitation onto the restitution. After all, there’s no real moral victory in refunding 3 years of payments if in fact a citizen was wronged for 15 years. For the sake of argument, I’m going to use a 15-year period for the remainder of this post. If someone can make a logical argument (not a legal one) for why only 3-years fits, I’m willing to listen.
Some quick facts and assumptions: Fullerton currently has about 135,000 individual citizens, all of whom have an equal stake in the city’s financial well being, who pay taxes of some sort, and whose rights ought to be considered by the council when voting to decide how to handle the water tax issue. That’s about 10,000 more people, with rights, than there were 10 years ago. On average, a person moves once every 5 years. That’s just shy of 2,000,000 moves for Fullerton residents over a 15 year period. Of the ~50,000 housing units in Fullerton, just under 50% of them are renters.
Here’s the best one: Under 40% of Fullerton residents have lived in the same house since 1999.
People come, they go, they pay taxes, they die, and they all use water. Not all of them pay water bills.
I don’t have a hard number, but I’m going to throw out 50% as the number of renters in Fullerton whose water use is rolled into their rent payment.
Here’s why refunding the water tax sucks and why it’s probably a violation of your individual rights:
Water bills are issued on a month basis based on monthly usage. Over 15 years, that’s over 8,000,000 water bills for Fullerton households. Of the 8M only 3.2M are going households that haven’t had any turnover. The other 4.8M get divided to folks who move in and out of Fullerton—many or most of whom no longer live here. In other words, if you’re not one of the few people who are getting a full refund payment, you’re one of the many people who are getting screwed. It’s substantially worse if you’re renter who doesn’t pay a water bill directly to the city. You (and I) get screwed the most. We get no refund, despite water bills being approximated in our monthly rent checks, and we get to subsidize refunds for those who do receive them.
Sitting down and looking at the numbers, it’s difficult to prove that those getting screwed by the refund do not, at least, outnumber those who get made whole by at least a 2:1 margin. It’s probably closer to 4:1.
We have another word for a political system that exploits the majority for the benefit of a landowning minority. It’s called Feudalism.
Unless you’re King of Fullerton, you should oppose this refund. It’s not just; it tramples your rights, and is an excellent example of bad government as we’re clearly not granting due process to newer residents or renters. We ought to learn from the past and apply what funds would be used for the refund in a way that benefits the whole community (i.e. fix the pipes.)
We’re in this moral conundrum because of bad decisions made by previous leaders. We shouldn’t compound a wrong by making another wrong. To adapt to Mr. Paden’s statement: When something is taken from you, you don’t turn around and steal from your neighbor.
Yes, the water tax sucked. Yes, it sucks that we can’t make everyone whole. It sure sucks a whole lot more to screw over the majority of Fullerton residents to pay for the sins of something that we had nothing to do with 15 years ago. If you really feel this isn’t true, I suggest you deed your house over to the first Native American you see. After all, he or she got screwed over long before you did.
The illegal water tax has been going on for 15 years in the city of Fullerton and there have been virtually no improvements made to the city with that money that was paid by citizens, (including those that don’t live there anymore)-this extra windfall was put into the general fund for ?????-on the other hand, nobody stopped it in all that time, either.
I think, and this is only my opinion from a person who’s been paying her own bills and taxes for years in the U.S., unfortunately, the fate of that extra dough can only be determined in a legal manner- it would only be fair for everyone-right?
Yeah except they stole all the money!
I think it’s called restitution.
GIVE THE MONEY BACK !
“Yeah except they stole all the money!
“I think it’s called restitution.
“GIVE THE MONEY BACK !”
Give it back to whom? Is the city supposed to track down everyone who’s moved out of Fullerton in the last three years and send them a check for $40 bucks (the average rebate for an individual customer)? Or just give it to people who’ve lived here three years and screw the rest? The “illegal tax” mantra was created to inflame people during the recall. The surcharge was created in the 1970′s to cover the city’s general fund costs of supporting the water utility (things like accounting, purchasing, street repairs for water main breaks, etc.). It was created long before Prop 218 and was perfectllegalgl through at least 2006. Quirk and Chafee tried to explain this during the Council meeting, but facts mean nothing to fanatics.
No matter what you think of the water surcharge, you don’t solve one mistake by making more mistakes, If the rebate triggers more cuts to the budget, will anyone benefit? You might get a momentary vicarious thrill out of “making the city pay”, but the city is its people. Who’s going to pay for a closed library branch, or unmowed parks?
As Ryan says, the only people who will benefit from a rebate are large long-term land owners (like the Kiing of Fullerton). The most ethical way to handle this is to look for alternatives that will benefit the most people possible, find ways to make those alternatives work, and put them into action. But three of the Council members are beholden to one person who financed their campaigns, and he insists on extracting his pound of flesh, no matter how it may hurt the other 134,999 people in “his” city.
It was ok to do this type of taxing in the 70′s
Point is, as of 2006 it was not ok and calling it illegal is not a scare tactic-at all.
The type of water tax that was essentially made up to help the City budget, was made illegal in 2006 by prop 218- illegal. Law was passed, prop 218-makes it illegal.
According to 218. any tax that doesnt go toward the specific utility it claims to be for, is illegal. There is no sending any monies to the general fund. Its illegal to do so.
Any new taxes, according to Prop 218, need to be voted in, otherwise the tax is illegal.
In 2006. it should have been stopped.
Why no one, including citizens (not just government), didn’t say anything about this back then is a a mystery. Why citizens kept voting in the same people in government is also a mystery.
That’s why it appears that the only fair way to find out the fate of this money that was collected after 218. should be determined by a judge.
It is not any ONE person in Fullerton that called this water tax illegal, it was the Howard Jarvis Tax Association that calls it illegal. I know they do, I spoke with Jon Coupal myself back in October of 2011 and he told me that. I’m not sticking up for anyone, but what is truth is truth.
Here is the letter sent to the City Manager and the Council back then regarding this illegal water issue, you are free to contact them for confirmation:
http://taxdollars.ocregister.com/files/2012/01/HJTA-letter.pdf
here is prop 218 definition:
http://www.lao.ca.gov/1996/120196_prop_218/understanding_prop218_1296.html
merijoe,
You seemed to have missed Noclib’s point. He’s not denying that after 2006 the tax was illegal, he’s questioning what should be done about it now and he makes some excellent points.
P.S.”Inflame people” not synonymous with “scare tactic”.
I didnt miss his point, I made reply points too in my comment-
“That’s why it appears that the only fair way to find out the fate of this money that was collected after 218. should be determined by a judge.”
Scare tactic, replace with, inflame people-my bad
Ryan is more informed on this issue than I am. I cant argue this point. I can, however, say that i can count my conservatuve friends on one hand, and Ryan is at the top of that list. Congratulations on your first blog Ryan. . I look forward to many more.
We argue all over the place — but while it’s sometimes heated it’s never nasty. I’m thrilled to have him on board.
Merijoe and anonster
You both make valid points. The illegality is arguable, since even after 200, laws generally aren’t retroactive. And the HJTA is not known for being unbiased. Nevertheless, call it what you will–a tax, a surcharge, etc.–there are still two ways to approach it. Use inflammatory language to get people’s emotions up and make decisions that might be popular now but will harm a lot of people in the long run. Or engage in a rational discussion and do what’s best to make it right. The knee-jerk reaction to “give it back” might sound good until you look at the ramifications. One of the options presented to the Council was to reimburse the water utility by having the general fund underwrite more repairs to the aging water system. That seems to be one way to benefit the larger community, which was Ryan’s point. As explained in the agenda information and at the meeting, the city isn’t stiting on the money it collected, so its not like it can just a write checks to everyone. The only way to give it back all at once is to make additional and even deeper cuts in the general fund part of the budget. If they asked me what to do with my 40 bucks, I’d say reinvest it in my drinking water!
Vern. Please don’t give your readers an opportunity to celebrate. Larry Gilbert is very much alive and well. My departure after 9-11 last year was to focus on church leadership challenges, shutting down over 400 CA redevelopment agencies, fighting the CA High Speed Rail and running the re-election campaign for Mission Viejo council member Cathy Schlicht. Glad that you have found a conservative blogger to offer some balance to the Juice.
Rumors of your departure were neither exaggerated nor to be confused with any rumors of your death. To twist Mark Twain.
Noclib1-just out of curiousity, where does the figure of 40 bucks come from? seems to me 10% x 15 years x once a month is way more than 40 bucks.
Merj-
Front page Fullerton Observer early Sept. issue. It was actually $48 bucks-I like to rou d down. So for the three allowable years we’re talking about $150 per average resident. That’s still pretty cheap for a decent water system. A lot cheaper than bottled water, which isn’t monitored as closely as municipal systems.
Sounds cheap but multiply that $150 x all the residents who were charged an extra 10%. And I still am not convinced of that amount just because it was on the front page of the Observer.
The Observer got it from the City’s analysis. And I’d be more inclined to believe them than the HJTA.
Merijoe, I think you and I are looking at opposite sides of the same coin. Yes, collectively $150 per customer times the number of customers is a huge amount–almost $7 million bucks. Individually, however, it loses some of its impact. In terms of the water system, there’s not much any of us could do for $150. But $7 million dollars would buy a lot of repairs. And remember, that $150 is only an average. As Ryan pointed out in is lead post, the ones who stand to make the most are those who have owned a lot of property over the long term. The individual homeowner will get a lot less. And what about apartment renters? The owners may get a refund, but do you really think they’ll pass it along to their renters? If its a matter of fairness, then anyone with a stake in the rebate should get some kind of benefit; some people think the best way to do that is to reinvest in the water system that serves everyone.
Flory, Chaffee, Fitzgerald will likely have an eye-opening 2013 along with the City Manager and City Attorney. They seem to all believe that they are some how immune from prosecution. They couldn’t be further from the truth.
The issue is they stole the money, there was money from water bills that by law was only allowed to be used for water system issues, buying water, upgrading and repairs to infrastructure.
But instead the city stole the money and used it for what they needed it for, which was the new increased police and fire pensions, mostly.
So illegally stolen money.
There is a law that says they only have to go back three years, so they got 15 years of stolen water money and they *might* have to pay back a fraction of that, three years worth.
It will hardly make the water ratepayers who had their money stolen for 15 years whole now will it?
Why is the conventional wisdom “give it back, it was never yours to steal in the first place”? Because we as a society don’t want crime to pay at whatever level. We don’t want the city to steal money and misuse it illegally and get away with it at all. It’s not right.
That they only have a 3 year liability for that stolen money is their advantage, isn’t it?
That all being said I have mixed feelings about this. I don’t want crime to pay, but the city stole the money and now the water infrastructure purportedly now needs that money to fix it which precludes giving it back. Should we deliberately harm the city (which is us) by giving the money back, or should we fix the pipes with the money which was what the money was supposed to be for?
If they hadn’t gotten caught would these ill gotten gains ever be used to fix the water system, or would they still be using it to backfill police and fire pensions? I suspect the latter.
So it’s a big giant mess, and the money should be taken from where it was put and the pensions reduced accordingly. Like that’ll ever happen! Heh.
The theory on the 3 years of exposure is based on the Statute of limitations for constructive fraud, which clearly our previous city council engaged in along with conspirators being the FPD and FFD. Good luck getting money back from the public safety pension contributions made to Calpers, but there are provisions by which clawbacks are absolutely legal and appropriate. The city attorney and manager should be on this – but they probably are so ignorant that because they’ve been living a teflon kind’ve veneer for so long and gotten away with it. There are some officials that are going to be in some serious hot water. This is only the beginning.