Why I am Voting "NO" on the 1% Sales Tax

In general, I am pretty progressive. I believe in "we all do better when we all do better," and I love Saint Paul with every inch of my being. But I don't believe in the 1% sales tax. 

No, it's not the "1¢ sales tax," but rather1%, which would put Saint Paul's sales tax at 9.88%. That's not only as one of the highest-taxed places in the state (I can't remember if Duluth is a tiny bit higher), but also in the country; for example, New Orleans, which is known for taxing tourism, has a 9.45% sales tax. (edited - with recent sales tax changes, this will put as as the 5th highest in the US).

Ok, you say, but shouldn't Saint Paul be gaining sales tax from people who come in to the city and use its facilities? Shouldn't they be paying their "fair share"? I reject that argument. If they are coming in for theater, like the Ordway, there's no sales tax on tickets. If they are buying goods, I don't see a lot of places where they would not simply cross the city border to get it at a lower rate; for instance, gas is about 10¢ a gallon lower on average in Minneapolis lately, in no small part due to sales tax. I would imagine there are a few specialty places people would go that are only in Saint Paul, but I would imagine several places with big ticket items (like my friend Kieran's piano shop) might see this as a good reason to move. I don't know about you, but I am seeing a lot of empty storefronts in the city, downtown Saint Paul is emptier than I have ever seen it, and the restaurants I love keep closing. 

To be fair, the one place I do see the city collecting more money in this case is from online retailers like Amazon, but in that case, we're just leaning into a regressive tax that targets the lowest-income households.

"But the roads! (and the parks!)" you may say. We all know that driving on the roads in Saint Paul has been no picnic — years of deferred maintenance are causing extreme issues. For now, I am going to put aside a maintenance schedule and what should or should not have been done. Here's the map of the roads that are targeted for work based on the 1% sales tax (I don't have a similar park map unfortunately). 46.3 miles of road (of the approximately 869 miles of road in the city, so about 5%). No (primarily) residential streets will be affected.

Originally, the ballot language was to say that, if you don't vote for the tax, property taxes might go up. Which might still be the case (and will certainly be the case for the 822.7 miles of road unaffected by he sales tax). So, out of curiosity, I sat down to look at how much my property taxes have gone up recently.*

On Ashland, so a generally moderate house in Summit-University, my taxes have gone up 176% in the last 15 years.

On Summit (Macalester-Groveland), for the house we inherited from my mom, they have gone up 123% in that same period.

For Hague (also in Summit-University), which we bought in 2020 to resell (and which we will eventually finish and will be a jewel!), taxes have increased 126% in just that 3 years.

For Winter Street, where my father-in-law lives in Capitol Heights, property taxes have gone up 521% in the decade we have owned it.

So yeah, I don't really want my taxes to go up — either sales tax or property tax. But it begs the question — with property taxes increasing that much, where exactly has that money been going?

* This is a back-of-the-envelope calculation that looked just at tax increase, not on value increase. I can say that the houses have maintained their value, but I can't imagine they have increased dramatically. And that's immaterial anyway, because except in the case of Hague, we are not selling.

ETA #1 - Another reason I am against this is that I think it will have the effect of actually reducing sales tax revenue in Saint Paul, as people buy in other areas to avoid the tax. This will actually reduce sales tax revenue for things I really care about, like Cultural STAR (NOT the position of the committee, which does not take a position — my own personal feeling).

ETA #2 - For those of you who counter with "But people who don't live in Saint Paul but who use the facilities should pay their fair share," this basically comes down to people who attend events at Xcel Center and Allianz Field. Nothing else brings in large amounts of people who live outside the city (except those who walk down Summit, but I digress). In that case, a sales tax is a very blunt instrument. We could enact a special tax on sales at those venues (who I believe received TIF funds, by the way), and get the "fair share" that way.