April 28, 2009

More than 700 people turned out Tuesday night to loudly denounce a city plan to implement a 2 percent tax on renters.

With many wearing red shirts and waving signs, the crowd at the Tucson Convention Center roared as more than 75 people spoke against the proposal.

The crowd surged with standing cheers and fervent sign waving reminiscent of a campaign rally every time a speaker referenced renters' inability to pay the proposed new tax.

Cheers followed speakers contending that approval of the rental tax would cost council members their jobs.

"There's another solution to the budget, that is to cut spending," consultant Andy McKnight said. "You people are just not doing your job."

Monica Stocker, who was in the military with her husband before returning to Tucson, said she couldn't afford the new tax in this economic environment, adding there are few renters that could.

Stocker cried as she explained how she and her husband had to ask their parents for help to make ends meet.

"We cannot afford this, none of us can," Stocker said. "It doesn't make sense, there's no way to justify it."

Dale Bieber, said he is on a fixed income and that made him learn the difference between needs and wants.

"I wonder if you have learned the difference between wants and needs," Bieber told the council. "You're talking real money and it's my money."

Several speakers told the council's six Democrats that they should be ashamed of themselves for considering such a regressive tax. One speaker told the council Democrats they should resign from the party if they pass a rental tax.

One of those speakers was former state Rep. Tom Prezelski, a Democrat, who said Democrats are supposed to believe that taxes should be administered fairly. A rental tax, he said, does not do that.

Prezelski, a renter, said council members should not vote for an unfair tax on renters just because they feel like they can get away with it politically.

The hearing, which began about 6 p.m., was still going on as of 10 p.m. This was the only scheduled public hearing with unlimited ability for residents to speak.

The council is set to approve the city budget in June.

There were a number of speakers who also implored the council not to cut the budgets of non-profit outside agencies, which is one of the things the new rental tax would help fund. Hotel owners and employees also turned out to oppose a $1-a- night increase in the city's bed tax.

Many in the crowd waved signs sporting sayings such as "No Rent Tax," I Rent and I Vote," "Enough is Enough" and "Don't Tax Us."

The crowd was raucous throughout, especially early on.

However, people began to leave midway through the hearing. Several speakers who turned in cards and were called on to speak later in the meeting did not do so because they had already left. Many speakers were bused in by groups opposing the tax and left when their buses departed.

Early on the crowd booed as Mayor Bob Walkup tried to skip over the public hearing portion of the meeting to first discuss other scheduled agenda items.

Walkup soon changed his mind after hearing the crowd. "OK, all right, we're going with" the public hearing, Walkup said.

The new rental tax would be assessed on property owners with three or more residential rentals. Landlords who spoke at the hearing said they had the right by law to pass the new taxes on to their renters and said they would do so.

The new rental tax would raise $10 million and is part of a larger set of $30 million in tax increases proposed by new City Manager Mike Letcher to balance the budget for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1.

The new tax would cost a resident paying $600 a month an extra $144 a year. A renter paying $900 a month would pay an extra $216 a year.

Only 500 people were let into the room where the hearing was held because of fire code regulations. Speakers queued outside the room to await their chance to speak.

Several hundred people couldn't get into the hearing room as the meeting started.

Keith Smith , who wore a red Tucson Tea Party shirt to the TCC, said "it was definitely inappropriate" that he had to wait in the lobby and listen to the hearing through a loudspeaker.

Smith said city officials should have planned better for the large turnout, or opened an additional hearing room when they saw the number of people couldn't fit inside the room.

"It was strategically done to wear us down so we won't stay around to voice our opinion about the rental tax," Smith said. "I truly believe that."

When Smith got his chance to speak at the hearing, he told the council that Tucsonans were tired of being taxed for pet projects of council members.

"What I'd like to ask you is to live within your means like the rest of us have to do," Smith said.

Contact reporter Rob O'Dell at 573-4346 or rodell@azstarnet.com.