Blog note: this article references a recent grand jury report.
Marin County Parks staff has the green light to move forward with a proposal to extend Measure A, a quarter-cent sales tax that provides funding for parks, open space and farmland preservation.
The Marin Board of Supervisors gave county parks director Max Korten permission Tuesday to bring an ordinance back to it for approval to place a measure on the November 2020 ballot. No date was set for the action.
Measure A was approved by Marin voters in November 2012 with 74% support. Since it became operative on April 1, 2013, the sales tax has generated an average of $13.4 million per year to support Marin County’s 16,000 acres of parks and open space, as well as local parks and farmland. The tax is scheduled to sunset in 2022.
“It’s really been an incredible time of being able to address long-deferred maintenance, vegetation management and fuels reduction, habitat remediation and improvement, trail improvements — all kinds of important work,” Korten told supervisors at their Tuesday meeting.
At that meeting supervisors also approved a request from Korten to investigate reducing weekend parking fees at Stafford Lake Park in Novato, McNears Beach Park in San Rafael and Paradise Beach Park in Tiburon. The county charges $10 to park at these sites on weekends during the summer. Parking during the week costs $5.
Supervisors also gave Korten permission to consider cutting the $5 swimming pool entrance fee at McNears Beach Park.
Korten made his requests after briefing the board on a survey of Marin residents that Marin County Parks conducted to determine the public’s level of satisfaction with the department’s performance and priorities. More than 4,800 people took the five-minute survey between Feb. 11 and March 25.
“With this survey we wanted to check back in with the community and ask folks, what is the most meaningful work that we’re doing?” Korten said.
More than 75% of Marin residents who took the survey said the parks department is doing a great or good job. Survey respondents expressed the strongest support for sustained or increased funding in three areas: vegetation management and wildfire fuel reduction; facility maintenance and upgrades; and trail maintenance and upgrades.
More than half of the respondents said they would like to see increased funding for vegetation management and wildland fuels reduction.
The Marin County Open Space District owns about 16,000 acres of wildland, 10% of which is managed to reduce fire hazard.
During fiscal 2017-19, Marin County Parks spent $6.49 million of its $13.8 million in Measure A revenues on grants to the Marin Agricultural Land Trust to help it acquire four agricultural conservation easements. It also spent $957,313 on vegetation management and fire fuel reduction and $253,748 on road and trail management.
Korten said the survey results informed his decision earlier this year to use $2.32 million in Measure A funds to pay for a 14-member Marin County wildland fire crew to assist in removing vegetation from county parks and open space over the next two years.
Survey respondents also said that the cost of entrance fees was the leading barrier to park use, hence the proposal to cut fees, Korten said.
He said the regional parks where he’s proposing to cut fees attract some of the county’s most ethnically diverse, low-income residents, whereas the county’s preserves, which are free, often serve wealthier, less diverse visitors.
Eva Chrysanthe, a member of the public who commented on the proposal, said, “I grew up swimming at Paradise Cove and also at Tamalpais High at the public swimming pool. Reducing fees for people who can’t afford it is really, really critical.”
Supervisor Dennis Rodoni was the only supervisor to comment.
“Measure A has proven so valuable to not only county parks and open space but all the cities,” Rodoni said. Of the Measure A funds, 15% is reserved for Marin cities, towns and special districts for use in their parks or to do vegetation management.
Rodoni said that if MALT is to meet its goal of protecting 100,000 acres of farmland by 2040, “this will be a very important part of that.”
But in an email, Mimi Willard, founder of the Coalition of Sensible Taxpayers, wrote, “This whole thing needs a soup to nuts review.”
Willard noted that in a report released last month the Marin County Civil Grand Jury recommended creation of a joint powers authority to coordinate wildfire preparedness and a quarter-cent sales tax to help fund preparedness efforts. She said that proposal is likely to appear on the 2020 ballot and a proposition to renew Measure A would compete with it and confuse voters.
“Perhaps any renewal of Measure A should be considered in 2022, not 2020,” she said.
April May 12, 2019
Marin Independent Journal
By Richard Halstead
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