Tayer: When the yes-man says no

There’s an aphorism that circulates within the Boulder Chamber that I’m a yes-man. I love a good idea and always want to jump on board in support of a solution, project or program that can move our community forward (and maybe a few ideas that just seemed good). That kind of “yes instinct,” though, can be perilously impulsive and over-stretch resources — which is why it’s good that my staff teammates are teaching me to say no.

In that same spirit, the Boulder Chamber encourages you to say, “No on 2K,” and reject  the City of Boulder’s proposed $400 million property tax (actually, $650 million, when computing interest on the bond debt) that will appear on this November’s ballot.

Let’s first talk about the problem that the city is hoping to solve with this proposed new tax. Soon after assuming her Boulder city manager role, Nuria Rivera-Vandermyde had her department leadership conduct an accounting of all the deferred maintenance on our municipal facilities. That includes the public safety building, recreation centers, fire stations and so on. It turns out that the list of deferred maintenance is enormous.

How this might have happened isn’t entirely surprising. Let’s be honest: Funding building maintenance isn’t sexy, glamorous or whatever descriptive adjective you want to ascribe to something more akin to eating your vegetables than a Lindsay’s ice cream treat. Put in municipal government terms, the sweet treats look more like funding for an exciting new discretionary initiative or a long-beloved program. 

I’m not pointing fingers here, but we can all understand why our political leadership might prefer to kick the can down the road on a new boiler system or capital replacement fund, when there are so many other enticing (and, at times, urgent) “needs” that demand their attention. And let’s face it, we’re all guilty of a parochial interest or two when it comes to a particular program or service we fight to preserve against the municipal budget axe. That’s the shadow of a “yes instinct” in all of us.

Our collective incapacity to say no is most starkly reflected in a municipal budget that has grown about 41% in the past six years against a compounding inflation rate of 27%. Yet, during that period of budget growth, we failed to set aside enough money to keep up with facilities maintenance. And now, with City of Boulder tax revenue failing to keep pace with inflation, our capacity to begin digging out of our capital-facilities hole is declining precipitously. 

They say the first step in recovery is admitting you have a problem. Our city staff has painted that problem in stark terms. As with any problem behavior, though, the solution typically isn’t a quick fix. Yet that is exactly what is being proposed: The largest municipal property tax increase in recorded history. That looks like an additional $401 annual tax payment on every million in assessed property value for residents and $1,588 for every million in assessed value for commercial property. Speaking for our local businesses, that’s a significant additional expense they can ill afford during a period of tremendous economic instability. 

Rather than jumping to the quick fix, the Boulder Chamber urges city leadership to pursue the more challenging process of comprehensively scrutinizing municipal expenditures, considering if they still fund priority needs, and evaluating whether they’re delivering the desired return on investment. This includes an assessment of current dedicated taxes to determine if there’s an opportunity to sunset them in favor of generating resources for alternative priority programs and facilities. Only then should we begin evaluating the full spectrum of unfunded needs and how we can most efficiently address them.

This is no different than the budget analysis every successful business and fiscally prudent family conducts on a regular basis. Before you say yes to a new expense, make sure the need is real, that you’ve explored other optional approaches to meeting the need, and ask how highly prioritized it is compared with other financial obligations. We should demand the same character of analysis in our municipal budgeting before simply raising the specter of new taxes on our residents and businesses.

And that is why the Boulder Chamber is endorsing the campaign against Ballot Issue 2K: Vote No on 2K | Boulder Recreation and Safety Bond. That doesn’t mean there aren’t municipal infrastructure issues that demand our attention. There are, and we stand ready to tackle them — in partnership with our city staff, elected officials and engaged community members — when the proposed solution is backed by evidence of greater fiscal scrutiny. But for this election cycle, despite my predilections, this reputed yes-man will be voting No on 2K. 

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