Ideas on funding/fixing public safety

[FOTD]

Great post, Inteller.

BTW, a representative of a local band big internationally was recently placing posters in L.A. and was cuffed and taken to jail by a private enforcement force. Weird. But that's what we are headed into....the privatization of portions the city can no longer afford. Except, in this case PWD code enforcers can still be paid out of that departments funds....it's the police and fire outsourcing that concerns me.

This devil has few suggestions to cover the permanent deficit....he wishes he could offer something constructive other than "move." Tulsa is a large Muskogee.

[RecycleMichael]

Thanks for the research, Inteller.

I really don't think people are going to change their purchase locations based on less than half a penny sales tax very often. I see that Tulsa is among the lowest city sales tax in the area and isn't making enough to cover some items that I think are crucial to the quality of life I want.

I am only talking about adding an additional 47 cents per hundred dollars purchased.

Nobody wants to pay more anything, I understand that. But even in a difficult economy it seems affordable to me.

[MH2010]

I keep hearing a consistent rumor of deannexing portions of Tulsa in an effort to cut costs associated with public safety and public works.  Has anyone else heard this rummor?  Anyone have any thoughts about it?

[Red Arrow]

Free ride on Tulsa'a back?
 
Electric: the big power plant is in Jenks.  There is a peaking station near the Jenks plant.  I think there is another big plant around Oologah and I know there is one near Chouteau. The last I heard, the PSO plant near downtown is not generating electricity.  I don't know how much the City of Tulsa paid for the wires to my house in Bixby.

Water: COT may own Spavinaw and Eucha but they are hardly in the city proper.  COT sells water to the suburbs. I believe water to the burbs from Tulsa costs more than water to COT residents. I assume the local government(s) around the reservoirs is(are) properly compensated for the loss of use of the land where the reservoirs are.  I assume the property owners where the two waterlines go to get the water to Tulsa from Spavinaw are properly compensated. I remember reading they cannot even store hay on the ROW.  Same thing for the property owners from Oologah to AB Jewell. I suspect that COT is freeloading off the Corps of Engineers in the case of water from Oologah and Lake Hudson.

Sanitary sewer:  I believe Bixby has it's own.  I know sanitary sewers were installed a few years ago here where septic tanks have been working since the 60s. There were some low areas that definitely needed them.

Storm sewers:  Clean up your act.  I don't want Tulsa street run-off polluting the river water in Bixby.

Trash: We have to pay a private trash hauler. They only take common household trash, not much else.  I once put out an old metal lawn chair and they wouldn't take it because it was metal.  They probably go to the same landfill as COT trucks but I am not familiar with the dumping fees.  On free dump day, I  am not allowed to participate (for free) unless City of Bixby participates (I assume at some cost).  Then I only get to dump one load, not as many as I can.  While the landfills may be in the city corporate limits, they are certainly not in the desirable living areas.

Fire: Bixby has its own fire department.  Chances are you won't need their services unless your car catches fire.

EMSA:  I pay directly each March, even though I believe my health insurance will cover the ambulance ride.

Police: Bixby has its own police force too, with patrol cars.  For the one time in your life that you may come to Bixby, be sure to have a fake ID showing Bixby residency or our police will not help you if you need it. (NOT)

Sales Tax:  I actually do most of my shopping in Tulsa, not Bixby.  Walmart, Food Pyramid, my favorite liquor store, Quik Trip for car gas..... all in Tulsa City limits. I will admit to going to Lowe's at 111th and Memorial which is in Bixby and Aldi's and Schlotsky's both in Bixby.  I rarely go to any of the new stuff on the east side of Memorial between 101st and 111th. I sometimes go to the Reasors in Jenks since I work at R.L. Jones Jr/Riverside Airport.  I sometimes go to the Reasors at 71st and Sheridan (and use COT roads to get there) because they have Campbell's Pepper Pot soup there but not at Jenks.  You are correct that I am not going to make an everyday purchase based on less than 1% difference in sales tax.  It wouldn't pay for the gas to get there.  Some jurisdictions get grabby about sales tax.  Presently most states want "use" tax on stuff bought in other states. How long until it gets to the city level?  Oh, you bought those peaches in Porter?  You owe Tulsa "use" tax for bringing them into the city limits.

Fresh Produce:  Here's an area that some of you seem to like.  What have you done to help pay for the farm land and roads to get that fresh produce to the Tulsa city line before they get to the "farmer's markets" in Tulsa?  That is, above and beyond buying the products?  Does Tulsa charge sales tax that Bixby or the local growing areas don't get? Maybe Bixby should charge a special export tax for produce going to Tulsa.

Other goods and services:  How much of the stuff you buy is actually grown, manufactured, etc within the city limits, or even Oklahoma?  Probably not much (except for Marshall's beer).  Is Tulsa getting a free ride on the infrastructure outside the city limits?  Roads, police, fire, free toilets on the interstate outside of Oklahoma,......

BOK Center: County project?  Should it have been located in Jenks, Owasso, somewhere else?  Is Tulsa getting a free ride on the county?

City income taxes:  

The best I could find on the internet is that Houston and Dallas have no city income tax.  The max sales tax allowed is 8.25%, including the state sales tax.  Texas is clever though and I'm sure they make up for it somehow.

I did some checking on my old nearby stomping grounds (pre 1971) of Philadelphia, PA.  It appears they have some sales tax devoted to the city.  They do not have a personal "income" tax.  A funny quirk in PA law a long time ago didn't allow them to tax unearned (interest, investment) income.  They do have a wage tax on compensation.  If you live in the Phila city limits, for Jan - June 2010 you pay 3.9296%, regardless of where you earn that money.  Suburban companies are required by state law to withhold that for Phila.  If you pay an income/wage tax in the place where you work outside of Phila, OK, you still owe the whole 3.9296% to Philadelphia.  Non-residents who work in Phila pay 3.4997% for the first six months of 2010.  Doesn't matter what other income taxes you pay, including your home town. The rates for the 2nd half of 2010 aren't posted.

I'm glad I don't live or work there.  For more info: www.phila.gov/Revenue/FAQs.html  (And other pages within the site.)

I agree a company won't choose a location based only on taxes on its employees.  It may be a contributing factor in order to pay competitive salaries/wages. Look at the few (advertised) percent the Tulsa police and firemen got caught up with, the reason for this thread.

My point is that no place is a stand-alone sustainable entity.  Not the city, not the suburbs, not the rural areas.  
 

[waterboy]

You make a lot of assumptions. Fine. Obviously Tulsa is such a drag on the burbs. Cut yourselves loose and be prepared to do battle on your own. Higher water prices, toll booths at the city limits and perhaps, surcharge taxes for non residents only. Maybe you can depend on those county employees to take care of you. The ones who have to apply for welfare to augment their low pay. No sharing of our river rescue operations either and after paying for your own, don't forget to budget for training. Lots of other shared responsibilities unmentioned. Power? Its owned by an out of state company anyway.

No one in the city will miss your cookie cutter shopping, your snout houses, your single lane traffic jams, your stifling, elitist conformity and your condescending attitudes. So for heavens sake, do your own thing so we don't have to hear you whine about how corrupt, criminal, inept, expensive and politically inbred we all are here cause we endeavored to have a professional police force for a cosmopolitan community. Or how stupid we are to want to improve the core of the city instead of surge madly into the surrounding farmland. But beware, we just lost 10 dozen police officers and since the wealth and brains are obviously moving to the burbs, I expect the criminals will follow the money. At least they won't have a high speed rail system to help them get there.

Yea Redskins! Yea Spartans! Yea Tigers! Yea Trojans et al. Boo stinky midtown elite! Boo downtown dregs! That's the spirit! Seriously, I agree with you, we are all in this together and I so tire of hearing complaints about how the poor and overtaxed middle class (there ain't one anymore) are being raped by greedy townies who just don't understand that the answer to our problems is lower wages, less opportunity and the re-location of government offices into abandoned shopping centers.

During the worst recession in my lifetime, including the Reagan debacle of the early 80's when crime also skyrocketed, my city decides its a good time to break the police union and geld the firemen. No negotiation, no search for alternatives. Just take it or leave it. And now, the rumor that merging with the hated county government, long rumored to be just as inept and maybe even more criminal is a possible solution? That, my friends, is a city with problems living in a fairy tale.

[YoungTulsan]

I have been under the impression that since Vision 2025 passed, our ability to raise sales taxes inside Tulsa has been maxed out.   We have a good 4 years before any sales tax revenue will be freed up and put up for grabs.  2014 is when the 3rd penny and the 4-to-fix 1/6th cent have been stretched out to by the 2008 streets tax.  2016 is when Vision2025's 6/10th comes up for grabs.  We are pretty much SOL until those dates.  The city might make a pre-emptive grab at V2025 in 2013 or 2014 to head off the county, as well as combine it with the other freed up tax streams.  We have 4 years until then to either come up with something else or just wait it out.

By that time, streets will be a pressing issue again.  Fire and police, we can only imagine.

When that time comes, we will have essentially 1 and 2/3rds cents to possibly allocate to the city between the 3rd penny, streets tax, and V2025 expiring.

[YoungTulsan]

I keep hearing a consistent rumor of deannexing portions of Tulsa in an effort to cut costs associated with public safety and public works.  Has anyone else heard this rummor?  Anyone have any thoughts about it?

As someone on the inside at the police dept. you would probably know better than others which areas would be classified as "drags" on the city budget. 



My first guess is just about everything east of 145th east ave (Or at least 193rd) -  Why is that part of Tulsa?  Did the city planners that annexed that portion at the time think the area was about to explode with growth ala 71st & Memorial, Owasso, or Broken Arrow?  What revenue producing value is out there?  Are there some factories / industry I'm not thinking of?  The only thing I can imagine is the reservoir being part of Tulsa proper.

The way it sticks out so far, and the relative low population density would immediately make me think it is a drain on TPD to respond out there.

[Hoss]

As someone on the inside at the police dept. you would probably know better than others which areas would be classified as "drags" on the city budget. 



My first guess is just about everything east of 145th east ave (Or at least 193rd) -  Why is that part of Tulsa?  Did the city planners that annexed that portion at the time think the area was about to explode with growth ala 71st & Memorial, Owasso, or Broken Arrow?  What revenue producing value is out there?  Are there some factories / industry I'm not thinking of?  The only thing I can imagine is the reservoir being part of Tulsa proper.

The way it sticks out so far, and the relative low population density would immediately make me think it is a drain on TPD to respond out there.

It was probably annexed thinking that industrial (and jobs) growth would materialize from the Port of Catoosa.  Why do you think 244 was built as an eight lane highway when the rest of the major highways in town weren't?

[Red Arrow]

Actually some of the assumptions I made, such as proper compensation for land owners by the water lines from Spavinaw, are in Tulsa's favor (even though I intentionally made them sound like Tulsa is not paying).  Maybe you know how much they are compensated.  On the other side, perhaps you know how much COT paid for the development of Lake Hudson and Lake Oologah.  I don't.  Toll booths entering the city can also be met by toll booths exiting the city. Oops, I forgot, none of you ever leave the city. All of your goods come in like the Berlin Airlift so there is no need for any roads leaving the city. We will put a toll booth on the railroads leaving Tulsa too.  I don't believe I have seen "Tulsa County" as the primary sponsor on the Bixby or Jenks police cars or fire trucks.  I don't get to BA or Owasso much so I can't speak for them.  What county employees am I counting on? I guess maybe the tax assessor. Bixby has City of Bixby police and fire. I'll give you river rescue. Power by an out of state company... you are the one who implied Tulsa provided the power grids.

Your taxes will increase as you demand what Tulsa has always provided for you. Water and waste systems, power grids, emergency services, judicial and policing systems.

I agreed that we pay for Tulsa water with an implied profit to Tulsa although up until a few years ago Bixby had its own water supply from the lake near Leonard. Bixby has a municipal court. We even have a Post Office and our very own zip code.  I know, all the mail goes through Tulsa.

As boring as it may be, most of my shopping is satisfied by cookie cutter shopping.  Do you spend all your money in boutique shops?  Never in your life been to a WalMart, Target, Albertsons, Food Pyramid, Sears, McDonald's.....?  Where do you classify Dillards, JC Penny, and Sears?  They have shops in the despicable Woodland Hills Mall which, like it or not, is in the COT limits and pays sales tax to Tulsa. Sears has a store at 21st and Yale.  Pennys has a store at 41st and Yale.  Does that count as Tulsa?  Specialty shops is why I want to live near but not in a city. I hope that downtown can retrieve some of these kind of businesses.  I have said that long before this.  I don't know what a "snout" house is. Ours is part of an addition with similar styles, mostly single floor ranch houses with medium pitch roofs (I can walk on it) but not like the California burbs just after WWII where you could make a legitimate excuse that they all look alike.  Most of the single lane traffic jams are part of COT outer reaches but I'll agree a significant portion of the traffic is leaving Tulsa. Remember that Memorial is US 64 south of the Creek Turnpike so Tulsa is not the sole funder of maintenance.   I don't believe I said anything about

corrupt, criminal, inept, expensive and politically inbred we all are here cause we endeavored to have a professional police force for a cosmopolitan community. Or how stupid we are to want to improve the core of the city instead of surge madly into the surrounding farmland.

I did agree that maybe the police and fire personnel may need to compromise due to the financial situation. In general, I support them. I think there is too much missing information to make an informed decision on whether the city or the police/firemen have the better case.

Just as you  

so tire of hearing complaints about how the poor and overtaxed middle class (there ain't one anymore) are being raped by greedy townies who just don't understand that the answer to our problems is lower wages, less opportunity and the re-location of government offices into abandoned shopping centers.

I tire of hearing complaints that suburbanites should support you in a style to which you would like to become accustomed.

[waterboy]

As someone on the inside at the police dept. you would probably know better than others which areas would be classified as "drags" on the city budget. 



My first guess is just about everything east of 145th east ave (Or at least 193rd) -  Why is that part of Tulsa?  Did the city planners that annexed that portion at the time think the area was about to explode with growth ala 71st & Memorial, Owasso, or Broken Arrow?  What revenue producing value is out there?  Are there some factories / industry I'm not thinking of?  The only thing I can imagine is the reservoir being part of Tulsa proper.

The way it sticks out so far, and the relative low population density would immediately make me think it is a drain on TPD to respond out there.

Actually, they did expect Tulsa to explode in that direction. Real estate development in the late 60's to the mid 70's was expanding in several directions- south, southeast towards BA and east. Eastward seemed promising because of the navigation channel, the airport expansion and its easily developable gently rolling land. Thats why Eastland was so promising. Several things happened that screwed that movement. The underlying geology was shale which shifted and broke up the slab foundations. Expensive to repair and builders didn't stand behind them. A few tornadoes practically cleared a few new developments in the mid 70's then the economy soured. Many builders moved to more profitable southeast and BA development but some stayed and made heavy use of 235(?) low income funding to build less than desirable neighborhoods. Then Eastgate floundered and the area stagnated. So, yes there were high expectations.

[sgrizzle]

This little ole machine has let technology overtake the human brain.  Encased is the knowledge of a thousand professors with instant recall.

Our technology has created poverty here and is well on the way to create another black hole in the universe. We are only a flash of light in the chain of life and have reached the point where others failed. 

That is either one of the most insightful things ever written or complete nonsense.

Either way, it needs it's own poster:

[Nik]

I was actually coming here to post exactly this (raising taxes), but it appears somebody else had the same idea. Here are the current sales taxes for Tulsa as well as some suburbs and other large Oklahoma cities:

(these figures have been provides by others in the thread, but I had already typed them up before I saw them)
Tulsa: 3%
Oklahoma City: 3.875%
Broken Arrow: 3%
Sand Springs: 3.5%
Jenks: 3%
Bixby: 3.5%
Glenpool: 4%
Norman: 3.5%
Owasso: 3%
(source: http://www.tax.ok.gov/publicat/copos/copo1Q10.pdf)

Tulsa had $15.8M in sales tax revenue in 12/09, 14.5% lower than the 12/08, or $2.7M. My math may be simplified or off, but a .5% increase should get us to about $18.4M, <$.1M short of 12/08's revenue.

I would propose that the City raises the sales tax to 3.5% for ONE YEAR. At the end of that one year, hopefully the economy will have recovered mostly and the sales tax will be dropped back to 3%. However, I have another provision. Any revenue greater than the previous period goes into a rainy day fund. So for instance, (I'm making up numbers here) if the revenue for 7/10 (after the .5% increase) is $19M and the revenue for 7/09 was $18.2M, that $.8M difference goes into the rainy day fund. The rainy day fund could be used if the economy hasn't fully recovered after the sales tax expiration and still forces the Tulsa government to live within the budgets that were used to and gives the city more time to correct any wasteful spending.

[TURobY]

actually, I'd say they give everything east of garnett to catoosa/broken arrow

That's too far west from where I'd put the boundaries. I'd say definately include 129th, and very likely include up to 145th. The Eastgate area is too far away from Broken Arrow, but there is continuous development linking the area to Tulsa.

[BKDotCom]

We must close the sales tax gap!

[shadows]

That is either one of the most insightful things ever written or complete nonsense.

Either way, it needs it's own poster:

Sgizzle:

Sorry to offended you on the facts of history only sustain that technology is the dominating factor in the rise and fall of the nations before us.  As we are a captivate in a globe that limits our access to space by the aging process.   We search for the technology used to build the great pyramids of Asia, Central and South America.  Records assume that it was technology that created poverty among the inhabits that led for them not to be able to sustain the quality of life demanded by their supposed superiors. 

Roosevelt created jobs by building roads and bridges by the shovel not technology of the machines.   At present we have focused on technology to reproduce the jobs that it has eliminated in a trickle down economy, already in a declining market. 

Many of the intelligent analyst are warning that the situation has no way of improving until we address the thorn that created it.  It reported that those cities that are just waiting to hire the laid off policemen are also in trouble with their budgets.

Tulsa, if operating under the statute budgeting act them they could have included an extra 10% to the last budget in anticipating increase income.  If that is being done then the shortage can run as much as 20% figured from last year budget.  Even the Abacus would not be needed to see where reductions would be needed in a maxed out taxing structure. 

Show us a sketch of the city being operated with robots.