[Kings County] Measure K falling short

Blog note: this article references a recently released Kings County Grand jury report released earlier this year.

Local law enforcement officials expressed disappointment Wednesday that Measure K, the sales tax increment to fund public safety, was falling short of the two-thirds vote it needed to pass.

With all precincts reporting, the proposal had received 11,761 out of 17,720 votes cast, which comes out to 66.37 percent.

With just 40 more votes, the measure would become law.

There are still provisional ballots to be counted, though it's unclear exactly how many. 

There are also mail-in ballots postmarked Tuesday that haven't been received by the elections office. If the ballots arrive by Friday, they can still be counted, according to Kristine Lee, Kings County registrar of voters.

Out of the 48,523 registered voters in Kings County, 73 percent vote via absentee ballot.

"It's a little bit frustrating when you get that close," said Kings County Sheriff Dave Robinson. "We knew it was going to be a challenge, but we felt hopeful going into it."

Robinson doesn't think it's likely the remaining uncounted ballots will push Measure K over the threshold.

"It's just what it is at this point," he said.

"It's tough when you get that close," said Hanford Police Chief Parker Sever.

Sever wondered if an error in the original sample ballot mailed out to voters "could have affected the results."

The original sample ballot mailed out to 47,000 Kings County voters mistakenly left out a pro-Measure K argument signed off on by Sever, Robinson, Kings County Fire Chief Bill Lynch, Lemoore Fire Chief John Gibson and Kings County Supervisor Doug Verboon.

Kristine Lee, Kings County registrar of voters, said that the company that printed the sample ballots made an error. She said that a correction including the pro-Measure K argument was mailed out separately to all voters.

Measure K would have kept the sales tax in Kings County at 7.5 percent going into 2017 and directs .25 percent of that to support public safety agencies in Kings County.

Without Measure K, the tax is slated to drop to 7.25 percent on Jan. 1, 2017.

The money generated by Measure K would have been distributed to local public safety agencies proportionally according to the population of the cities in which the agencies operate.

In the case of Kings County, the distribution would have been based on how many people live in county jurisdiction outside the incorporated cities of Hanford, Lemoore, Corcoran and Avenal. This includes the population of the unincorporated communities of Armona, Stratford, Kettleman City and Home Garden as well as all other rural residents.

It's estimated that, starting in 2017, the measure would have raised $4 million annually, with $1.5 million split between Hanford police/fire; $1.25 million split between county sheriff/fire; $675,000 split between Lemoore police/fire; $335,000 to the Corcoran Police Department; and $240,000 to the Avenal Police Department.

The numbers were estimates only. The final figures depended on how much local residents spend in 2017.

Measure K included an oversight committee to supervise how the money will be spent. The ballot language required that all the money raised be spent on public safety.

Public safety officials campaigned hard for Measure K.

Hanford Fire Chief Chris Ekk argued that the proposal would have helped hire nine firefighters to permanently staff a third fire station the city is planning to open next year.

That would allow the city to keep staffing Fire Station #2 at Houston Avenue/10 1/2 Avenue. In the event that Measure K didn't pass, the fallback plan was to shift the firefighters from Station 2 to Station 3.

In that scenario, Station 2 would be operated as a storage facility and would not be a functional fire station.

At the county level, Lynch said passage of Measure K would have added a second firefighter to three out of four rural county stations that currently only have one firefighter on duty on any given shift.

A critical Kings County grand jury report released earlier this year said the single-staffed stations are unsafe and create delays in fighting fires that could lead to unnecessary personal injury and property loss.

Sever held a public forum in March at the Kings Gun Center arguing that Measure K was needed.

Sever said that Measure K corrected the mistakes of Measure S, a November 2014 ballot proposal for Hanford voters that would have increased Hanford's sales tax rate from 7.5 percent to 8.5 percent but didn't guarantee the increase would go to public safety agencies.

Measure S only received 44 percent of the vote.

June 8, 2016

Hanford Sentinel

By Seth Nidever