Springfield To Survey Voters On New Tax For Police & Fire Pension
29 02 2008A release that just arrived from the city:
A telephone survery of registered voters in Springfield will take place beginning the evening of Friday, Feb. 29, 2008, to test voter attitudes regarding the use of a designated public safety sales tax to fund the Police/Fire Pension system deficit.
The survey will be conducted for the City of Springfield by the ETC Institute of Olathe, Kan. If residents receive a phone call from a representative of ETC Institute, the call is legitimate.
The scientific survey is being conducted in order to provide City Council with empirical information regarding voter attitudes as it moves into its 2008-09 budget preparation process.
To be clear, this is a NEW tax to fund the police and fire pension.
My opinion is that I would support it as long as a sunset provision was in place and clearly outlined the funds can go to nothing else.
I agree. Some state law is kicking in within, I think, five years that requires the state to withhold a city or county’s share of its sales tax revenue and divert the funds to any underfunded pension plan. We can’t have that happen in Springfield.
I think it would be beneficial to fund the police and fire services with just a sales tax(nothing out of property taxes) that is directly allocated to the expenses of these departments. I would also like to see the police and fire departments work more along the lines of CU, just without all the illegal cash donations, in the manner that they answer to the city but also operate independently. I believe the police and fire departments could operate just like a private business and do it much more effectively without having the city intervene.
The pension plan should be taken out of the hands of the city council and the city leaders and administered by a private company or individual which can be held accountable to the funds performance by those that are putting money into it.