Placer County voters to decide on sales tax increase for transportation improvements
PLACER COUNTY – Placer County voters are looking at a sales tax to raise more than $1 billion for transportation and infrastructure improvements.
"At the end of the day, Sacramento and the state are not going to take care of us here in Placer County," District 2 Supervisor Shanti Landon said.
Landon is in support of Measure B, which calls for a half-cent sales tax that would raise $1.58 billion over the next 30 years for transportation projects approved by municipalities and the county. One in $4 would be returned to Roseville, Rocklin and Lincoln.
"Highway 65 and the bottleneck is a huge issue for Lincoln in particular, which is a large part of my district, especially when it comes to public safety," Landon said. "There is no hospital that exists in Lincoln, so anybody in Lincoln has to be transported down to Sutter Roseville or to Kaiser in Roseville."
If it passes, Measure B improvements include:
- Widening Highway 65 to at least three lanes with up to five in each direction between Galleria and Twelve Bridges
- Widening Baseline Road from Foothills Boulevard to Highway 99
- Connecting Highways 65 and 99 by building a new thoroughfare called Placer Parkway
The Placer County Transportation Planning Agency says raising the money locally is key to competing with other counties for additional federal funding and Placer is the largest county in the state without a local match.
"You used to get straight formula dollars based on the population, the number of lane miles you had, the number of buses, that sort of thing," said Matthew Click, executive director of Placer County Transportation Planning Agency. "But anymore, as transportation funding at the state and federal level has declined, they make local governments compete for that funding with other local governments and one of the things you have to compete on the basis of is the ability to have a local match."
Not all are in favor of Measure B.
The California Taxpayer Protection Committee called it a "massive sales tax increase that will damage our local economy, shut down businesses and send shoppers and their money out of our community."
But Landon says that's exactly why the measure needs to pass.
"Quality of life wise, this measure is so important. It's incredibly difficult for us to be able to recruit and retain large businesses that can be a great boost for our economy," Landon said.
Independent auditors already are in place. The ordinance will add a citizen-based four-member oversight committee from each of the cities to oversee the books.