Getting people to vote to raise their own taxes for something even as beneficial as light rail is like getting them to try kale.
Those who make decisions in terms of their health for the coming decades are likely to give it a shot. They'll probably like it if it's cooked right (sautéed with garlic and olive oil, probably) and will be better off for having done so. Yet those open-minded enough to do so are obviously a very small minority.
That's part of the reason two penny transit referenda — one on each side of the bay — have failed miserably in recent years.
On Friday a panel assembled by the nonprofit Urban Land Institute included transit leaders from two cities where rail has become a reality in recent years, Orlando and Phoenix.
In Pinellas County, voters rejected a proposal to increase the sales tax by one percent. It lost 62-38. A similar initiative in Hillsborough County four years earlier only fared slightly better there. Polling done after the election reiterated the obvious — people don't want any more taxes.
"It was about the tax,” said Stuart Rogel, outgoing CEO of the Tampa Bay Partnership “Additionally there was a sales tax swap that was a portion of the initiative. The property tax was going to be swapped for the sales tax. Going in we thought that would be a very favorable component, but it was actually a very negative component.”
But local leaders on both sides of the bay who supported the measure — and there are many — say they're going to try again to win hearts and minds on better transportation. They just have to figure out how.
Ginger Corless, a consultant with Tindale-Oliver and Associates, helped with the planning and development of the Orlando area's SunRail, a commuter line along former CSX tracks that opened on May 1 of this year. SunRail initially had its hurdles, including reluctance to accept the plan among some officials from the plan's mid-'90s outset even though it was fully funded. The Florida Legislature turned it down in 2008 and again in 2009. Even after the legislature finally approved it, Governor Scott froze it for six months in 2011.
Corless said instead of a referendum, the City of Orlando and three counties — Seminole, Volusia and Orange — banded together and got matching funds from the state and federal governments (it probably helped that they had Orlando-area State Rep. John Mica, who is very transit-friendly, in their corner).
“We did not do a referendum," she said. "And the reason we chose this, as leaders and planners, was that we felt we had to come together as governments on a regional basis…We have to understand that we are not alone in this, and we have to work together with different agencies…but what we also had to do was prepare our communities for the change.”
Phoenix area officials went a different route. Metro Light Rail, a 20-mile rail line connecting Phoenix with major suburbs Tempe and Mesa, became operational in 2008, after several failed referenda. After voters in Tempe approved by 54 percent a 1996 half-cent sales tax to fund the beginning stages of rail planing as well as supplemental bus circulators and a streetcar, Phoenix followed suit the following year with a 20-year, half-cent sales tax on the ballot.
"It was looking really good," he said. "Until a week before the election, when the governor came out and said 'it's a bad idea, don't vote for it.' It captured 49.94 percent of the vote. The governor killed it. And it had nothing to do with the state. He was pissed off at the mayor, and he decided that he was going to show him who's boss."
Three years later, though, 65 percent of voters approved a .4 percent sales tax for 20 years.
"At the time I believe it was the most successful transit initiative on the ballot in the United States," he said. "It was citizen-driven. Citizens chaired the committee that put the plan together. It was very visual, so the pamphlets and information that went out had a map that said these are all the components of the plan […]. "
He said the rail line is extremely popular, with an average of 48,000 riders a day. The thing is, the Great Recession did a number on their revenue — Greenlight Pinellas' opponents often used potential financial shortfalls as a reason to reject the initiative.
"The challenge we have right now is, the recession hit us very hard," he said. "To the point where we are probably running, I think we're running $1.7 billion short of anticipated revenue."
With the tax sunsetting in six years, the plan is to go back to voters and ask to extend the tax, possibly increasing the amount connected.
With the two failed referenda, Tampa Bay transit advocates are likely to look for funding that would allow them to avoid asking the voters to increase their own taxes.
"It's clear that the sales tax increase is not a popular option in Tampa Bay," said Kyle Parks of B2 Communications, a St. Pete PR firm representing the Urban Land Institute locally. "We want to try to facilitate discussions not only about how you pay for transit, but how do you have all the different kinds of transportation work together? Are there things you could do without light rail that would make an impact, like bus rapid transit?"
This article appears in Dec 11-17, 2014.