City Councilor Jan Sivertson, organizer of the 1% sales tax referendum campaign, and Jim Boyd, champion of the broadband Internet network that would be partly funded from the proposed tax, urged county commissioners Tuesday, October 13, 2009 to let the public know they support the tax.
“Do you have a united front in support of the sales tax?” is the question Sivertson said she is hearing in the community. People are also wondering if the county board will be able to make the seven projects happen if the referendum passes: outdoor recreational facilities at the Cook County Community Center and at Birch Grove Community Center, capital improvements to Superior National at Lutsen, a biomass-fueled energy plant in Grand Marais, a Grand Marais Library addition, a new community center/pool facility, and a fiber optic cable network
” bringing ultra-high-speed Internet (“broadband”), phone, and TV service to everyone on the county’s electrical grid.
“I don’t think this process would have evolved this far if we weren’t in support of this tax,” Commissioner Fritz Sobanja answered.
Commissioners Bruce Martinson and Jan Hall were more reticent to endorse the tax as a board since the decision is up to the voters. Martinson said he didn’t think the board should take sides on the issue, although as individuals he thought it would be fine Hall agreed.
Sobanja thought people might be asking for a guarantee that the projects they favor will be funded. Possibly they lack trust in the board, don’t know the amounts being considered for each project, or are concerned that one project would take money away from another, he said.
The broadband project was added to the list of potential projects late in the game, Boyd said, and it is seen by some as an interloper. People became skeptical. The 65% vote required by state law on the referendum’s second question, which would authorize the county to operate a phone service, is a high hurdle, he said. “I think you need to be more visible and more vocal in your support.”
Commissioner Bob Fenwick said that when the 1% hospital tax ended, he was in favor of not bringing it back for another purpose, but since then, important projects have been identified. “We buy into that 1%, even though we got there in a very circuitous way,” he said. The tax would fund some things that could not be funded in any other way. Property taxes couldn’t fund them, and tourist dollars would be needed to make them possible.
Fenwick said he thinks this is the biggest single economic issue that has come to the county in decades. He believes the board is committed to funding each of the seven projects in the amounts outlined at the end of the 1% committee process.
The broadband project would be largely funded by a federal stimulus grant intended for projects that would not happen any other way. “Thisis a once in a lifetime opportunity,” Fenwick said. “You can’t look this gift horse in the mouth and say, ‘This is an interloper.’”
The proposed community center project has been reduced to a size that the county would have the money to operate, Fenwick said, with an operating deficit no worse than the pool’s current operating deficit.
Commissioner Jim Johnson said that while he supports the tax, it’s time for the board to step back, let grassroots efforts take place, and find out what the public wants to do. Some people in his constituency do not want the tax, he said. He suggested the public might want to know if the county will create as separate an entity as possible to run the proposed broadband network rather than trying to run it themselves.
Not trusting the board should not stop citizens from making decisions, Fenwick said. The board is trying to do what is in the best interest of the community. “We’re not going to get the trust of the community,” he said, “but that shouldn’t stop us from doing the right thing.”
How the 1% tax might be used has changed drastically from when it was first proposed, Commissioner Jan Hall said. She said she supports the tax but has “some reservations,” although she did not elaborate on what those reservations were.
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