Questions
& Answers About Issue 14
Issue
14 is a temporary, 4.5 year, one quarter percent (1/4%) income tax
increase that if passed will generate about $3.2 million annually and allow the
City to maintain a safe level of fire
service and strengthen the police force in the wake of drastically reduced
state and federal funding.
Here are some common
questions and answers:
Q: Why is the
city operating with less money?
A: The
repeal of the Estate Tax, a decline in the Local Government Fund from the State
of Ohio, and the expiration of federal stimulus funds the City has been relying
on to fund firefighter and police officer positions – are all reasons for the
revenue decline. Combined, these
reductions represent about $4.45 million annually in the City’s General Fund.
Q:
Aren’t there any other sources of money to pay for safety personnel?
A: Money from Enterprise Funds that generate their
own earmarked revenue like water and sanitation cannot by law be transferred
out of those funds to cover police and fire services; only money from the
General Fund or the Police Levy can be used.
Moreover, the stimulus-funded
grants previously applied for by the City are expiring at the end of the
year. There was no SAFER grant for fire
departments offered by the federal government in 2014 and it is uncertain as to
whether or not any SAFER grants will be offered in 2015. And even if another version of the grant does
become available, it is unlikely Elyria will receive an award for a third
time. Another version of the federal
COPS grant was available but required a monetary match by the city and future
employment promises. The City does not
currently have the money to meet these new requirements.
Moreover, these grants were meant to enhance
safety, not supplant basic city services.
When a city relies on grants to supplant basic safety services, it makes
those services vulnerable. For example,
it takes nine months to train a police officer before he or she can provide
service. If the grant expires in three years,
the police officer has only provided 27 months of active service and funding
runs out. The city can’t pay the officer
so the officer finds a position in another community and takes the training
investment to the next city. Elyria has
lost many highly trained safety personnel to six nearby communities in recent
months because of this practice. Police
officers are also reluctant to sign on with a City that relies on grants for
their salary because there is no job security for them or their families. Grants are helpful to enhance safety
services, but it is detrimental for a city to rely on them to fund core safety
services that deserve the benefit of stable funding. The new Brinda administration is trying to
stabilize the city’s finances by securing a revenue stream that can adequately
support core, basic safety services.
Q: What
has the City done to reduce expenditures?
A: The
City has already reduced almost $2 million in two years in both the General
Fund and Enterprise Funds. To address the
shortfall and keep the City moving forward, we have taken the following
proactive steps:
·
Requested a Voluntary Performance Audit by the State Auditor of every department in the City
to help identify potential cost-saving measures and benchmark performance.
·
Made workplace adjustments that have resulted in over
$2 million in savings so far (In both
General Fund and Enterprise Funds). This
has included rebidding vendor contracts, reconfiguring and consolidating some
departments, leaving 14 positions unfilled, automating systems, and working with
employee groups to adjust contracts – including reducing longevity in three
contracts.
·
Passed a five-year income tax RENEWAL last year to help stabilize core services.
·
Developed the City’s first Economic Development Plan to retain, expand and attract businesses and grow our
tax base. The plan is already partially
funded with federal, state and other grants and is beginning to see
results. For more information regarding all
of these initiatives, please visit www.cityofelyria.org.
Q: What will
the money from Issue 14 be used for?
A: The money generated by Issue 14
is exclusively earmarked for safety purposes by the administration and Elyria
City Council. Ordinances were passed to
prevent the money from being used for any other purpose. Issue 14 will:
·
Maintain 65 front-line firefighters – just enough to meet
national safety standards, state auditor recommendations and keep 13 of the 23
firefighters whose grant-funded positions are expiring with the SAFER grant.
·
Sustain a police force of 93 – keeps
three officers whose positions expire with a COPS grant and adds five new sworn officers to address the drug
epidemic and improve neighborhood safety and speeding and traffic concerns.
·
Provide a small recruitment incentive stipend to
Auxiliary Police to enhance safety (at present they get paid nothing); helps pay for
their uniform, equipment and training costs and will help provide a more
attractive career path for sworn officers.
·
Fund safety-related equipment, vehicles and capital
repairs and
emergency road and bridge repairs.
·
Support Police Department crime prevention initiatives including training programs
and materials, and surveillance cameras for downtown.
·
Support a Reverse 911 System capable
of mass communication in a community-wide emergency.
A: As an income tax, It DOES NOT tax retirement, social security,
unemployment, or disability income.
So if you draw your income from any of these sources, you will pay
nothing. You will also pay nothing to
Elyria if you work in a city with an income tax rate at the same rate or above
the City of Elyria’s.
Here
are some examples of how the cost of Issue 14 breaks out for other
residents. The current income tax rate
for the City of Elyria is 1.75 percent. At that rate, a resident of
Elyria that works in Elyria is currently paying $875 on an annual salary of
$50,000. If the rate were to go up by a ¼ percent, that same person would
pay an additional $125 per year.
If
a resident of Elyria works in another municipality, he or she pays income tax
to the workplace City. Elyria offers a 100 percent credit for those
residents who work outside of Elyria and pay to other communities. With
the current rate of 1.75 percent, if a resident of Elyria works in another
community that has a rate equal to or higher than our 1.75 percent, there is
nothing due to Elyria. If our rate would go up by ¼ percent to 2.00%,
residents of Elyria who work in another community would only owe the City of
Elyria if the rate of the City that they work in is lower than 2.00 percent and
then, and only then, they would pay the difference between the two rates.
For
example, if a resident of Elyria works in the City of Lorain, that resident
would still not owe Elyria anything because Lorain’s income tax rate is
currently 2.5 percent. If a resident of Elyria works in North Ridgeville
and earns $50,000 they currently pay North Ridgeville $500 and Elyria
$375. If our rate would go up to 2.00 percent, that same person would
still pay North Ridgeville $500 and Elyria $500. In this scenario, the
increase for that person to Elyria would be $125.
Q: Issue 14 is temporary… what does that mean?
A: Both the
recently passed ½ percent temporary income tax renewal and this Issue 14
proposed ¼ percent temporary income tax increase will expire at the same time
in June of 2019. This will allow the
citizens of Elyria, City Council and the City administration to assess the
needs of the City at that time and re-calibrate the funding sources based on
ever-changing state and federal revenue streams and the state of the local
economy.
Q: How
does Elyria’s income tax rate compare to other cities?
A: Elyria’s income tax rate is lower than many
comparable cities in northeast Ohio.
Even if Issue 14 passes and the income tax goes from 1.75 to 2 percent,
Elyria will still be under or about the same as comparable size cities. For example, the City of Lorain’s income tax
rate is 2.5 percent. If Issue 14 passes,
Elyria’s income tax rate will still be only 2 percent – a half percent lower
than Lorain. Likewise, other area cities
with income tax rates higher than Elyria include Parma at 2.5 percent, Euclid
at 2.85 percent, Warrensville Heights at 2.6 percent and Twinsburg at 2.25
percent. Other comparable size
communities at 2 percent include cities like Mentor, Eastlake, Cuyahoga Falls,
Cleveland Heights and North Olmsted.
Q: What will
happen to city services if Issue 14 does not pass?
A:
Without passage
of this small, temporary increase, the City of Elyria will be forced to reduce
the equivalent of 32 positions – a necessary move to balance the budget that
will impact personnel in the General Fund across the City and have a drastic,
negative impact on quality of life services to our citizens.
Safety will continue to be a priority so the
administration will be forced to pull the already scarce resources from other
departments in the General Fund to minimize the negative impact on safety
forces and citizen safety. The Brinda
administration will always do the best it can to provide quality services at
the lowest possible cost with the resources that are available. That being said, there are serious
limitations to what we can provide if we cannot replace this expiring
revenue.
Q: Why
do we need to replace expiring funding in the fire department?
A: The short answer is, if we want to at least
minimally protect our families and properties, we need to keep at least 13 of
23 expiring grant-funded front-line firefighter positions for a total of 65. While not ideal, in these times of austerity,
it will keep three fire stations open, allowing the City to meet national
safety standards and State Auditor recommendations – and minimize increases in
home owner and business insurance rates.
Each year the National Fire Protection Agency
(NFPA), made up of scientists, doctors, municipal leaders and fire
professionals meet to set policy and set minimum safety standards for life
threatening emergencies. Their standards
cover every aspect of firefighting from equipment to personnel. The NFPA standards were used to determine
SAFER grant awards. To meet these
standards and accept the previous SAFER grant award, Elyria was required to
have open a minimum of three fire stations.
Another important rating to home and business
owners is the City’s ISO rating. The
Insurance Services Office (ISO) is the leading resource used by
Property/Casualty Insurance Industry for statistical information used for
setting insurance rates. The inspections
are made once every 10 years. Elyria’s
10-year inspection just started October 6th. It is based on three parts: the fire
department’s ability to meet NFPA standards, the water supply and the emergency
dispatch/communications system. The fire
department is 50 percent of the score.
Elyria is currently a class 4 rating; 1 being the best and 10 being the
poorest. If Elyria drops from a class 4
to a class 5 rating because it cannot meet NFPA standards, this could raise
home owners insurance from between $100 - $700 per year depending on the value
of the structure and where it is located in the city. Commercial and industrial properties are
rated independently based on value and hazards.
Q: Why
do we need to strengthen our police department?
A: Your Elyria Police Department is just
beginning to get ahead of the drug-related crime in our community and needs
more help. Since being reinstated by
Mayor Brinda and Police Chief Whitely in March 2013, the Elyria Narcotics Unit
have been extremely successful with one sergeant and five detectives, but much
work remains. This drug problem is not
specific to Elyria; it is all over northeast Ohio and the country. But given that Elyria is a transportation
nexus and urban center, we have to be more vigilant about making sure that drug
dealers know that Elyria’s doors are not open for their business.
In 2013, as a result of their investigations,
narcotics detectives made 220 drug and felony warrant arrests that involved 76
undercover drug buys that resulted in the arrest of 82 drug dealers. So far in 2014, there have been 81 controlled
drug buys, and 136 arrests. Even more
sobering, the total street value of drugs taken off the street in Elyria just
this year is $418,800. And in the
process, they have confiscated 10 assault rifles, 19 hand guns and $161,055 in
US currency.
Drug-related activity has a direct correlation
with the number of home robberies in an area.
Moreover, routine traffic stops often lead to further investigation of
drug-related activity and tips for police.
The eight police officers that will be added to the Elyria Police
Department as a result of Issue 14 will be used to enhance street and traffic
patrols and strengthen the Elyria Narcotics Unit to provide even more of a
focus on neighborhood crime and drug interdiction involving heroin, powder
cocaine, crack cocaine, methamphetamine, prescription medication abuse and
marijuana.
