Scottsdale tries to salvage Prop. 490, a sales tax ballot measure, by changing its wording

The Scottsdale City Council has changed the wording of its description of a proposed ballot measure, in an effort to keep it on November’s ballot.

At issue is Proposition 490, which would enact a sales tax to pay for improvements at city parks and in the McDowell Sonoran Preserve. The new tax would replace an existing one that’s expiring, and would be lower than the current rate.

The Goldwater Institute challenged the city’s description of the new tax as a reduction — arguing residents would actually see a bigger reduction if the tax just expired altogether.

Court of appeals judges agreed and reversed a lower court ruling, ordering the city to remove the measure from the ballot. But Wednesday, the City Council made its wording change in an effort to allow voters to weigh in.

Sam Kmack of the Arizona Republic joined The Show to talk about it.

Conversation highlights

Let's talk through what the existing tax is and what it actually pays for, the one that's expiring.

SAM KMACK: Sure. So it was approved by voters in 1995 and has a 30-year lifespan. So it's set to expire June of next year. And it was a 0.2% sales tax that funded the city's acquisition of land for the McDowell Sonoran Preserve.

And so since that's about to expire next year, the city proposed this new — it's a new tax, but they billed it as a replacement tax for the 1995 taxe, as you mentioned in your intro. And it's slightly less. And it would fund slightly different things too. Upkeep on the preserve, yes. But most of the money that would come out of this new tax, Prop. 490, would go towards city parks.

The new tax would be lower than the existing one, but the Goldwater Institute said voters aren't being told that if they really want lower taxes, they should just let this thing expire and vote no.

KMACK: Exactly. And that was their big issue with it. Because the city did bill it as a reduction. In some sense, it would be, if it's a true replacement of the former one. Because the overall tax rate for the city, with all the sales taxes and everything combined would ultimately be lower because the new sales tax is slightly lower than the old one.

But Goldwater's big issue was like, “Hey, we can't look at these two things as just one kind of tax combined because the '95 tax is going to expire next June regardless of what happens.” So, essentially what residents are voting on is, you know, implementing a brand new tax on themselves, even though it's somewhat similar to the previous one. So it can't fairly be called a reduction. That's their argument.

What did the court of appeals say about that? Because they overturned a lower court rule judge, which had said that the measure can stay on the ballot. The court of appeals reversed that. What was their reasoning?

KMACK: They basically just agreed with that argument that Goldwater laid out ... But it's more, I guess there were two big pieces. One is that it just can't be fairly called a reduction for those reasons. And two, that the city did not do a good enough job of explaining what a no vote would mean in November.

As you mentioned, that it would be a, a larger reduction in the overall tax rate if they voted no than if they decided to approve Prop. 490.

The Scottsdale City Council met and quickly changed the wording of this. What did they do? And does that do enough to get this measure back on the ballot?

KMACK: Yeah, they basically just removed any mention of it being a replacement or a reduction. They shifted the language to make it clear that it's a new tax, something that was in line with what the court's ruling was. It's far more standard boilerplate language at this point. And as far as whether it does enough to get the measure back on the ballot, there's no reason to think that it won't be enough. But I guess that has yet to be seen, because they do have to send it in the Secretary of State's Office.

I'm not sure when it becomes official that the language changed. Assuming that there's no issue at the secretary of state, it'll probably be on the ballot if Goldwater doesn't sue again. And it seems like Goldwater's issue has been addressed. But it's been such a legal roller coaster, you never really know.