(Dec. 22, 2015) -- Within minutes of adjourning for the year, five City Council members (the bare minimum quorum with four members absent) quietly used what was labelled as a "Study Session" during the Dec. 22 Council meeting (to hear a city staff "infrastructure report" reciting asserted capital investment needs for transportation infrastructure and city facilities) to pass a motion that asks the City Manager, Finance Staff, the City Attorney and City Clerk to provide the Council with options for "new sources of revenue"...or more plainly stated: potential tax increase ballot measure(s) in 2016.

The item as agendized was: "STUDY SESSION: SCHEDULED TO START AT 5:30 PM...Recommendation to conduct a study session to receive and discuss the City's capital investment needs for transportation infrastructure and City facilities. (Citywide)"

The motion, made by Councilman Al Austin and seconded by Councilwoman Lena Gonzalez, was joined by Vice Mayor Suja Lowenthal and Councilmembers Roberto Uranga and Rex Richardson "to request that the City Manager and finance staff work with the City Attorney and City Clerk to provide options for new sources of revenue."

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Councilman Austin added, "Let's put it out there...Show us how to get there; how do we fix it? And I think this Council may need to consider options for identifying sources of revenue to make needed investments in infrastructure and other important city services. And so what I'm asking for staff is, can you guys come back in the next few weeks, in the early part of next year, with some information to help guide this Council on a decision in that regard?"

Mr. Modica said "if that's something the Council would like, we can certainly provide that." Austin replied, "thank you." Mayor Garcia stated, "Thank you...the second [on] the motion was Councilwoman Gonzalez" and she spoke in support of what Councilman Austin had stated (and also urged leveraging other funds, including federal dollars.) So did the three other Councilmembers present...and Austin's motion carried 5-0 (with Councilmembers Price, Supernaw, Mungo and Andrews absent for the entire meeting.)

City management presented Power Point slides, opening with a slide asserting in red numbers that the City has $2.8 billion in infrastructure needs over the next ten years ($280 million a year), a figure staff later acknowledged was a "rough estimate" and includes separately funded projects in the tidelands. None of the Power Point slides were online prior to the meeting, making it especially difficult three days before Christmas for the public to offer responses to city management's assertions...although LB Taxpayers Ass'n co-founder Tom Stout attended the meeting and responded. Mayor Garcia asked management to "brief" the absent Councilmembers on its prsentation, and said management's Power Point slides would be put up for the public after the Council meeting. Dec. 24 UPDATE: To view the Power Point slides, click here.

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An accompanying city staff agendizing memo recited infrastructure issues raised earlier in the year, and under "timing considerations," stated: "A Study Session is requested on December 15, 2015, in order to provide the City Council with a comprehensive report on the City's capital infrastructure needs."

However LBREPORT.com had separately learned through more than one City Hall source that management's "infrastructure report" was actually a vehicle by which Mayor Garcia could advance a proposed tax increase ballot measure for 2016, although we'd received conflicting information about what form(s) the tax increase might take (property parcel tax, utility tax increase, or something else.)

On Dec. 21 [the day before the Council session], LBREPORT.com made a Public Records Act request for records in the offices of the City Manager, Mayor and Councilmembers that related to the possibility of proposing a tax increase ballot measure(s) in 2016, including any polling, surveys or other estimates of public support or opposition related to such ballot measure(s). A few hours before the Dec. 22 Council meeting, city management responded, emailing that it intended to withhold "pre-decisional records that have been generated/produced" citing the statute's exemption for records reflecting "deliberative process." [LBREPORT.com doesn't concede that this is a valid defense for a city refusal to provide the records requested.] About a half hour after receiving the first email, city management responded [without any contact by us] that "In reviewing your request again, the City may have documents that meet your criteria. We will review for documents and will be in touch shortly."

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The "infrastructure report" was initially scheduled a week earlier but was postponed at that time by Mayor Garcia, citing a lengthy Dec. 15 agenda item in which the Council voted 9-0 to authorize a multi-million-dollar Civic Center transaction structured in a way that avoids approval by a vote of the people The Council's Civic Center vote will bind taxpayers for the next 40+ years to pay a private firm annual CPI increasing costs to tear down/rebuild/operate/maintain LB's Civic Center, avoiding voter approval that would have been necessary if the City had pursued seismically retrofitting LB's less than 40 year old City Hall at lower, fixed annual costs. Two independent sources (an award winning LB architectural firm and a Columbia University Master of Science graduate student's Thesis) estimated retrofits would cost tens of millions of dollars less than city management had estimated in-house, but neither management nor the Council sought marketplace bids (that would have established a retrofit's real cost) or invited public presentations from firms experienced in peforming retrofits to hear information presented independently of city management.

A week later on December 22, the Council's motion seeking options for "additional revenue" (tax increase) was eclipsed by a high visibility item on possibly naming a North Long Beach library for Michelle Obama (LBREPORT.com coverage here.)

In 2008, Mayor Bob Foster proposed a property parcel tax that he said would be used for infrastructure but effectively could have been spent for many things and raised over $700 million to try and convince voters citywide to pass it. The measure received just over a majority voted but failed to receive the necessary 2/3 voter approval required after then-Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske refused to assent to labeling the ballot measure a "fiscal emergency."

Foster traveled across the city, allowed by various neighborhoods and business groups to present his proposal without challenge or opposing views...and repeatedly refused to debate Terry Jensen, an expert in commercial real estate development and financing and a former member of LB's Redevelopment Agency, on the substance of the proposed measure. However a few neighborhood groups let Mr. Jensen speak individually, and he used the opportunity to methodically detail flaws in the measure. At the same time, grassroots efforts by the LB Taxpayers Ass'n (co-founded by Kathy Ryan and Tom Stout) publicly dogged the Mayor at his unopposed appearances. Word spread...and despite being badly outspent, the grassroots opposition prevailed; the measure received roughly 53% of the vote, but needed a 2/3 margin as a result of Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske's dissent. Schipske's Council term expired in mid-2014...and she was replaced by Councilwoman Stacy Mungo.

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At the Dec. 22 Council meeting, Mr. Stout came to the podium, noted the Council's vote a week earlier to spend millions for a new Civic Center, said the taxpayers' major costs aren't for infrastructure but for city salaries and pensions, called City Hall's "pension reform" to date a farce, noted pensions will be significantly increasing in the coming years and said money from a tax increase would be consumed by both pensions and raises [unless the City changes its way of doing business.]

Councilman Austin called management's report "chilling" and said the needs are "untenable with our current level of funding and our finances...I'm concerned that without identifying new sources of revenue, the City will not be able to address this $2.8 billion of long term infrastructure needs identified tonight without cutting critical services..." Councilmemebrs Gonzalez, Richardson, Lowenthal and Uranga also spoke in favor of the Council motion. Mayor Garcia thanked staff...and said he knew they'd been "working on this" for a while.

Long Beach voters in districts 2, 4, 6 and 8 will go to the polls in April 2016, and possibly in June 2016 if runoffs are needed, to choose their Council reps for the next four years. Lowenthal is exiting under term limits; Supernaw, Austin and Andrews have all indicated they plan to seek reelection (with Andrews using a write-in procedure to seek a third term with term limits.) The period within which candidates can file paperwork to qualify for placement on the Council election ballots opened on Dec. 21 and will close on Jan. 15, 2016...the same day Mayor Garcia is scheduled to deliver his 2016 "State of the City" message. All LB voters citywide will see statewide ballot measures, plus County, Congressional and Presidential candidate choices on ballots in June and November 2016.

Developing.

The text above was updated on Dec. 24 to quote Mayor Garcia, who stated after Councilman Austin spoke that Councilwoman Gonzalez had seconded Austin's motion, clearly indicating that the Mayor treated what Austin said as a motion. At the end of the item, Garcia inaccurately stated that the motion was to "receive and file," an inaccuracy reflected in the City Clerk's draft minutes.