Letter: Antioch Resident Seeks Leadership, Not 1% Sales Tax

Dear Editor:

Now we have a proposed life time 1% sales tax.  The problem is there was never an exit strategy for Measure C which was aimed at Antioch police services and code enforcement.

Two council members had two years to come up with something, three of them had four years to come up with a plan. With all that time, nothing was proposed which one can assume the only plan they ever had all along a plan was to simply extend Measure C.

The new wrinkle is adding 1/2 per cent aimed at raising $14 million which all of it does not go to police services, there is no oversight and no sunset. This new tax will drive business away from Antioch thus reducing money the city actually would bring in. Its counterproductive to what the council is actually trying to accomplish.

Let’s have some give and take here.

It is time to open the labor contracts which are financially killing us and freeze wages for the next three years.  Employees should pay more into the pensions and medical.  Every year the unfunded liabilities just keep growing and no one talks or cares about it.  This measure, whatever they manage to call it, will not be enough by itself to solve our city’s many problems—especially police services.

It would be nice if we could have some leadership from the council and put the brakes on this runaway train!  I am afraid if they don’t get this measure right, two years from now we will have a huge parcel tax for Antioch residents to vote on.

Marty Fernandez
Antioch Resident