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File Number: 16-231 <br />Councilmember Lee agrees with how the draft ballot is worded. <br />City Manager Zapata stated staff will bring options and if need be, will seek outside expertise <br />to draft the ballot language. The community may question why we are asking for new or <br />increases to existing taxes and the answer is that funds are needed to fund additional <br />services that the Council has prioritized including child care, traffic calming, art and culture, <br />and Code Compliance. The City needs to find additional revenue to provide these services. <br />Councilmember Lee stated that the sequencing of the questions or statements will have a <br />great impact on whether residents will vote for the measures. <br />City Attorney Pio Roda stated just like with Measure HH, all discussions are wide open, <br />however once the resolution is approved for the language of the ballot, all open discussions <br />must stop. The City cannot advocate for approval. All information must be non -biased, <br />factual in nature, and informative. There is an urgency to work through the measures so that <br />it can go before the Council no later than the first meeting in July. The City must have the <br />measures submitted to the registrar in August. <br />Mayor Cutter would like to go to Council as many times as necessary. If there is no time to <br />come back to Finance Committee, going straight to Council is fine. <br />Community Development Director Battenberg discussed the 3 other tax measures: eliminate <br />per employee portion of the Business License tax for businesses with 3 or less employees for <br />San Leandro businesses. This would reduce our Business License tax revenue for small <br />businesses, of which there are currently 2,500 and represents'/2 of the businesses in the City. <br />The cost of this proposal is approximately $300k however it aligns with Economic <br />Development goals to support small businesses. Also there is a proposed modification for the <br />collection of taxes for warehouses and wholesale distribution businesses. There is a request <br />to change from a "Per Employee Fee" to a $100/1,000 square feet which will generate <br />$450,000 per year. Currently, these types of businesses pay a very low fee, because they do <br />not employ many people, in spite of the fact that they generate substantial truck traffic and <br />negatively impact City infrastructure. Business License Renewals are collected annually in <br />January. Business Development will complete a small audit of the warehouses and <br />distributors. There is an exemption proposed for approximately 20 businesses that generate <br />more than $50,000 sales tax revenue per year. <br />Councilmember Lee incrementally asked if how many businesses have 4 to 5 employees. <br />Director Battenberg stated the proposed changes are not drastic. The 3rd change is to that of <br />the parking lots. Currently parking lots are charged on a per space basis and the proposed <br />change would amend it to 10% of gross receipts. The City of Oakland charges 18%. The City <br />of San Leandro has one business currently, Expresso Parking, and the proposed change <br />would generate an additional $500,000 per year. The proposed change would also level the <br />playing field because it is anticipated that when the Tech Campus opens they will be charging <br />for BART parkers $243 per day, Monday -Friday. Using the current method of calculating the <br />Business License of parking lots pay, the Tech Campus would be paying per space like that of <br />Expresso Parking but making less profit. <br />City of San Leandro Page 4 Printed on 5110/2016 <br />