Prop 1

[♪alt13]

WHAT IS PROP 1?

Prop 1 is a ballot measure in 17 counties that gives cities, counties and transit providers a quarter-cent in sales tax (except on food)—that’s one cent for every four dollars for local transportation. Prop 1 helps communities invest in transportation close to home: roads, trails, sidewalks, maintenance, increased bus service and safety features. Prop 1 will help fill the gap in transportation needs in our community. In counties with transit service, 40% of the proceeds will go to cities and towns, 40% to transit and 20% to the county. In counties without public transit, 40% of the sales tax will go to cities and 60% to counties.

https://www.prop1utah.com/

I hope this passes in every county. Don't let your county get left behind, vote yes.

 

[Joe Bagadonuts]

Someone told me that a large percentage of this money would go to UTA exec salaries. Is that true?

 

[DutchJazzer]

great more tax.

TAX
TAX
tAX
TAX

**** taxes, people dont seem to know what tax is for these days

 

[♪alt13]

Someone told me that a large percentage of this money would go to UTA exec salaries. Is that true?

No. It has to go towards extending service in the county it is collected in.

HOW DO I KNOW PROP 1 WILL GO TO MY LOCAL COMMUNITY'S TRANSPORTATION?

HB 362, the legislation that allows you to vote on Prop 1, has strong accountability measures that mandate by law that cities, counties and transit agencies must report to the state auditor to ensure funds are used appropriately. Prop 1 can only be spent on transportation – roads, maintenance, sidewalks, transit, etc. – not on salaries or overhead. Since the local option will be collected and invested close to home, you’ll see the benefits at work in your community.

https://www.prop1utah.com/

 

[mellow]

No. It has to go towards extending service in the county it is collected in.

But it is just a shell game, they might be able to show that all the money collected from this tax goes to "service" while atThe same time increasing salaries by diverting funds from other places.

This is the trouble with giving huge tax incomes to unelected, unaccountable, unregulated entities.

 

[♪alt13]

But it is just a shell game, they might be able to show that all the money collected from this tax goes to "service" while atThe same time increasing salaries by diverting funds from other places.

This is the trouble with giving huge tax incomes to unelected, unaccountable, unregulated entities.

Do you live in Salt Lake County?

 

[mellow]

no

 

[Joe Bagadonuts]

But it is just a shell game, they might be able to show that all the money collected from this tax goes to "service" while atThe same time increasing salaries by diverting funds from other places.

This is the trouble with giving huge tax incomes to unelected, unaccountable, unregulated entities.

This is my fear too. Every election cycle there is another one of these types of initiatives, and it is always presented as the socially responsible thing to do to support it and make your community infrastructure better... one tax on top of another tax on top of another and another. They are always tiny, but cumulatively they are not. Then, like clockwork, we learn that the exec level compensation is excessive and the parties they throw are lavish. This money is coming from somewhere. This money could have gone to repairing the roads and building the bike paths, etc, that this tax is supposedly meant for.

I have nothing against success, but there is a big difference between making profits off of a great product or service, and making big salaries off of a taxpayer skim. This is essentially the same thing we see happening on big defense contracts (only those are on a gigantic scale).

I'm still willing to listen to more info on this, but I'm leaning towards a "no" vote.

 

[♪alt13]

no

I'll give you the salt lake example anyway.

According to The Utah Taxpayers Association, an independent tax watchdog group, in SL the new tax would raise 48 million dollars next year. 40%,~19 million, of that would be earmarked for UTA. IIRC the highest paid UTA exec makes ~350k. To say that the money will go towards exec salaries is just wrong. The scales are of completely different sizes. Let's reform UTA, I'm with ya, but prop 1 is not for salaries.

If you're interested in your county here are some links:

Utah Tax Payers Association-Lists expected revenue by county
Prop 1 Utah Map- Shows projects, maintenance, and transit to be funded by the tax

 

[Joe Bagadonuts]

I'll give you the salt lake example anyway.

According to The Utah Taxpayers Association, an independent tax watchdog group, in SL the new tax would raise 48 million dollars next year. 40%,~19 million, of that would be earmarked for UTA. IIRC the highest paid UTA exec makes ~350k. To say that the money will go towards exec salaries is just wrong. The scales are of completely different sizes. Let's reform UTA, I'm with ya, but prop 1 is not for salaries.

If you're interested in your county here are some links:

Utah Tax Payers Association-Lists expected revenue by county
Prop 1 Utah Map- Shows projects, maintenance, and transit to be funded by the tax

These numbers add up:
https://utahsright.com/salaries.php?city=uta_salaries

These top salaries seem excessive to me for what is essentially a government job, and I would not be surprised if they include lucrative parachutes and pensions.

It's true that many of these salaries and bonuses have been reduced from where they were previously, but it still seems excessive:
https://www.deseretnews.com/article...hoping-to-boost-public-confidence.html?pg=all

 

[♪alt13]

These numbers add up:
https://utahsright.com/salaries.php?city=uta_salaries

These top salaries seem excessive to me for what is essentially a government job, and I would not be surprised if they include lucrative parachutes and pensions.

It's true that many of these salaries and bonuses have been reduced from where they were previously, but it still seems excessive:
https://www.deseretnews.com/article...hoping-to-boost-public-confidence.html?pg=all

First a lot of those people are engineers, accountants, etc. They're not fat cats sitting on a board. If you want a well designed well ran system you are going to have to pay people.

Second, that money is already allocated. To say that Prop 1 will go to salaries of top UTA execs you have to believe that they will increase those salaries with the money coming in. They aren't going to increase exec salaries by 30-40 million dollars, it's nonsensical. They wouldn't get away with it.

Third don't overlook the other 60% that will be going to cities and counties to pay for transportation.

 

[Ron Mexico]

We already have enough money from taxes going to this stuff, there is enough money to make great public transportation. We need to be more creative and cost effective with the money not increase taxes. Dont raise taxes, learn to fix the money problems first.

We are paying our Execs in SLC as much as large cities no reason they need to be paid the same as those people. Cost of living is much lower here and our city is much smaller.

Alt do you work for UTA? or for the government?

 

[♪alt13]

We already have enough money from taxes going to this stuff, there is enough money to make great public transportation. We need to be more creative and cost effective with the money not increase taxes. Dont raise taxes, learn to fix the money problems first.

We are paying our Execs in SLC as much as large cities no reason they need to be paid the same as those people. Cost of living is much lower here and our city is much smaller.

Alt do you work for UTA? or for the government?

No I do not.

We don't have enough money to pay for transportation. Not only is our population growing crazy fast but vehicles use less fuel, more and more are electric or natural gas, more people are turning to mass transit, and people are biking more.

I agree that UTA needs reform but cutting salaries at UTA will not make up for the gap between the money needed for transportation and the money available. How much do you think we could honestly cut from salaries?

 

[bigb]

UTA is a well run "company"? That's laughable.

 

[Ron Mexico]

No I do not.

We don't have enough money to pay for transportation. Not only is our population growing crazy fast but vehicles use less fuel, more and more are electric or natural gas, more people are turning to mass transit, and people are biking more.

I agree that UTA needs reform but cutting salaries at UTA will not make up for the gap between the money needed for transportation and the money available. How much do you think we could honestly cut from salaries?

Salaries are only part off the problem. They are wasting money everywhere. Throwing more money at it is a bandaid for a deep wound. Uta is one of the poorest run public transportation especially for the budget they have.

Sent from my HTC0P4E1 using Tapatalk

 

[♪alt13]

Salaries are only part off the problem. They are wasting money everywhere. Throwing more money at it is a bandaid for a deep wound. Uta is one of the poorest run public transportation especially for the budget they have.

Sent from my HTC0P4E1 using Tapatalk

Can you be more specific? Who is doing better with less money?

 

[Ron Mexico]

Can you be more specific? Who is doing better with less money?

Honolulu, Eugene, San Jose are a few that pop in my head.

Salt Lake City is around the 24th most used transit system in the US. We pay a much higher average of our sales tax .69 percent last time I heard. Which is well above the average. We have longer wait times than the average and less access to jobs via public transportation than average. They are also pretty low on most rankings by public opinion.

Then we could compare to other countries, since USA has poor transportation compared to many international cities.

I wish we would combine buses for high school kids and the city. It would save a lot of money. No reason kids need their own buses in high school.

 

[b_line]

Honolulu, Eugene, San Jose are a few that pop in my head.

Salt Lake City is around the 24th most used transit system in the US. We pay a much higher average of our sales tax .69 percent last time I heard. Which is well above the average. We have longer wait times than the average and less access to jobs via public transportation than average. They are also pretty low on most rankings by public opinion.

Then we could compare to other countries, since USA has poor transportation compared to many international cities.

I wish we would combine buses for high school kids and the city. It would save a lot of money. No reason kids need their own buses in high school.

They already do combine bases in salt lake. Kids at salt lake school districts ride uta buses on certain routes. Not all of them, but some of them are already doing that.

Saying that you want to do more with less is ridiculous. Add more routes with magic free buses and drivers who don't get paid? Where will the money come from to support more transit programs ?

 

[Ron Mexico]

They already do combine bases in salt lake. Kids at salt lake school districts ride uta buses on certain routes. Not all of them, but some of them are already doing that.

Saying that you want to do more with less is ridiculous. Add more routes with magic free buses and drivers who don't get paid? Where will the money come from to support more transit programs ?

I didnt know that in SLC but that is great, I wish we would do more with that. I have never seen a reason for separate school buses.

Money being spent on bureaucracy and inefficieny is a calling card of government programs in general. I would rather just spend my money on Uber or Lift instead of being taxed more for a crappy system that we are overpaying for. If you think we are spending our money for public transportation as efficiently as possible than I guess there could be a reason to increase taxes for it, but I dont. As the city grows and more people come in their budget increases proportionately to the growth, I dont see a need to for us to pay more per person and higher percentage of our income. I dont want to pay more taxes, we are already over taxed and generally when taxes go up agencies use their money less efficiently.

So we increased out Gas tax for public transportation but thats not enough so now we are increasing our sales tax another .25 on top of the .64 they are already getting? They are claiming this is a permanent solution. They claim inflation caused the .64 not to be enough but adding .25 will fix the problem for good...

Sorry I dont think increasing taxes will solve the problems. And paying our UTA execs the same or more as major cities that are 10x our size like LA is a prime example of wasting money but not the only thing happening. This money isnt just for UTA it can also go to roads, so we can continue to look at projects short sided and spend millions to fix a road just to have to redo it in a couple years because of an increase in traffic that was predicted and known ahead of time.

 

[♪alt13]

Honolulu, Eugene, San Jose are a few that pop in my head.

Salt Lake City is around the 24th most used transit system in the US. We pay a much higher average of our sales tax .69 percent last time I heard. Which is well above the average. We have longer wait times than the average and less access to jobs via public transportation than average. They are also pretty low on most rankings by public opinion.

Then we could compare to other countries, since USA has poor transportation compared to many international cities.

I wish we would combine buses for high school kids and the city. It would save a lot of money. No reason kids need their own buses in high school.

I looked up San Jose. The VTA is funded by a 1 and 1/8th cent sales tax and they have an increase on the ballot this year that is double prop1. They have also gotten quite a bit of funding from the state of California. I imagine they also get more from their sales tax because they have more wealthy residents in Santa Clara County than we do in SL. Further they benefit from surrounding counties with good transit systems.

Salt lake does have a .69 of a cent tax but surrounding counties are lower(this is why your transit sucks other counties). I bet if you looked at funding per rider(I can't find it) San Jose is funded much better.