I was on the KCBS evening news yesterday, after the station sent a crew out to film me. It aired at 5 p.m. They didn’t do a very good editing job, but it was nice to get my point of view across: that parcel taxes, of the kind Kevin Jenkins is proposing, are inherently unfair and arbitrary.
I’ve been keeping an eye on Jenkins since his extraordinary rise in the City Council and his appointment as interim mayor, and I must say he seems to me to be just another ambitious, young political hustler. He’s used his pretty face to parlay his career, perhaps envisioning himself as a young Barack Obama: who knows how high the ladder reaches? But with his new parcel tax proposal, he’s revealed himself as he truly is: just another woke grifter who thinks he can spend, spend, spend to fund his union-supported schemes. This is from the Barbara Lee school of politics that says homeowners are the ultimate piggy bank because they’re unorganized, and the tens of thousands of ignorant renters in the flatlands will always vote to increase their taxes because homeowners are rich and can afford it.
In the KCBS interview I emphasized one conclusion of my years-long research into parcel taxes, namely that the one-size-fits-all model, which taxes tiny little condos like mine at the same rate as a 5,000-square foot mansion in the hills, is undemocratic. There is a perfectly legal alternative: basing parcel taxes on the square footage of the property. Many cities have taken that approach. But a former Oakland City Auditor, when I asked her why she didn’t use that yardstick, answered blunt that it would make her job harder. “It’s much easier,” she told me, “to just impose a flat fee on all parcels, even if that is unfair to some owners.”
And there you have it: she would have had to work a little harder in order to make the system she oversaw a lot fairer.
Frankly, I don’t want to hear another word about “equity” as long as Oakland government relies on these discriminatory, regressive parcel taxes to fund their every scheme. You want equity, progressives? Then start by making your taxing mechanisms truly equitable. Base your parcel taxes on the square footage of the property!
Over and over, Jenkins tells the media, with his telegenic face and runway-toned body, how “diligently” the city is addressing its woes. That’s a lie, like some detergent commercial on T.V. that promises you cleaner, whiter, better-smelling clothes. What is Kevin Jenkins peddling? It’s clear: himself. It must be very exciting to be Kevin Jenkins, what with the charismatic Loren Taylor now out of the way, leaving him—Kevin—the most promising Black politician in Oakland.
Well, enough Jenkins-bashing. What I really want to do is get my urgent message across: The pols who run this town cannot forever depend on parcel taxes to pay for every idiotic “anti-violence” program they want to launch. Most homeowners in Oakland, at least in the flatlands, are people of modest means: many are elderly people of color, who saved their pennies to be able to afford to buy a house they could then turn into rental units, thereby giving a little assurance to a dignified retirement in their old age. Back in 1978, California experienced a taxpayer’s revolt that resulted in the passage of Proposition 13. Oakland, and California as a whole, are looking at another taxpayer’s revolt, as homeowners let these hustling politicians know they’re sick and tired of being taxed to death. Kevin Jenkins, be forewarned: you’re making enemies of people who could be helpful to you. Consider my suggestion to make parcel taxes be based on the size of the parcel.
Steve Heimoff