He lost re-election in Pasco. Now he wants to make it harder to raise taxes and fees

In his 12 years on the Pasco City Council, Bob Hoffmann has seen how easy it can be to raise taxes.

An extra 14 cents a month here for utility services. Another one-tenth of a percent there in sales tax for a new public facility.

“Pretty soon, bit by bit, you have a whole different world than you planned on having,” he said. “People don’t want big government. You don’t realize you get big government one slice at a time, one ‘yes’ vote at a time for these little amounts. And then when you suddenly step back and look at the (tax) burden, you realize it’s considerable.”

Hoffmann will be going off the council in one month after losing his re-election bid. But before he leaves, Hoffmann wants his fellow council members to consider imposing a supermajority requirement for all tax and fee increases in Pasco.

He says the last-minute proposal is about protecting local ratepayers and taxpayers, but also admits being concerned about five new members coming on the seven-member board.

Some new members, including his successful challenger Craig Maloney, have a vision for things, a “let’s do stuff” attitude, Hoffmann said. He is not against good ideas, but believes they often can lead to major projects that come with a hefty price tag.

“I’m looking at what the new council looks like — the members that are coming on, the members that are going off — and thinking that this would be a good safeguard,” Hoffmann told the Herald.

“The new council members are very capable individuals, very intelligent, very motivated, and they have great plans for the city,” he added. But they “don’t have the history of increases that have happened or the perspective when new increase are suggested or proposed.”

The issue will be discussed at Monday’s workshop meeting, which starts at 7 p.m. at City Hall, 525 N. Third Ave.

A supermajority requirement means that five of the seven council members would need to approve an increase. Currently, the council operates on a simple majority system, meaning four affirmative votes are required for passage.

When Hoffmann raised the idea of a supermajority requirement at a meeting earlier this month, Councilmen Al Yenney, Chi Flores and Tom Larsen all supported discussing the issue more.

Like Hoffmann, all three will be leaving the council at the end of the year. Larsen is retiring and Flores and Yenney lost their seats to opponents.

“The new, younger members are coming on and some of the older members who are retiring out are looking over the landscape and seeing what might be a wise action to do,” Hoffmann said. “It looks like a better idea now given the dramatic change. Five new members is a dramatic change.”

He said he has asked City Attorney Leland Kerr to advise them on whether Pasco, as a non-charter city, would need to take the issue to the voters in an election or if the council can enact the change.

The cities of Yakima, Spokane and Spokane Valley, along with Pierce County, all have adopted local supermajority requirements.

A policy brief by the Washington Policy Center says supermajority requirements are a routine part of all democratic governing systems.

“By approving a supermajority requirement for tax increases, local government officials would simply be stating a policy preference that they want a higher level of agreement before increasing the financial burden a city or county places on its citizens,” the 14-page brief states.

“As shown by the consistent support for this policy at both the local and state level, taxpayers expect reasonable limits, like a supermajority vote requirement for tax increases, to protect them from narrow, controversial votes being used to raise taxes without broad public support.”

Hoffmann said it was during a candidate forum before the general election that a citizen asked about a supermajority requirement, and he agreed it would be a good idea to “keep a lid on municipal spending.”

He would like it to include not only taxes, but changes to city fees like water, sewer, garbage and ambulance.

“It is not that often that there’s not at least five votes in favor of these, so it’s not like the city is going to come to a screeching halt and it’s going to cause a crisis,” Hoffmann said.

With the supermajority requirement, “any credible need for an increase in adjustment is going to get five people to agree to it, and it is going to take three people to kill it,” he added. “If it does get three people, then there’s probably a good reason why it should be reconsidered.”

This story was originally published November 26, 2017 at 4:40 PM with the headline "He lost re-election in Pasco. Now he wants to make it harder to raise taxes and fees."