A tough time for a tax hike
Homelessness is not the way to sell it.
Remember how city budget officials told City Council that they didn't need to worry about approving an expensive police contract because the budget situation was hunky dory? And then a few months later, after the police contract was approved, they came back with new math saying there was a $33 million deficit?
So now City Council is considering asking voters to approve a tax increase this November to help address the deficit.
That's really unfortunate. Conventional wisdom is that it's a bad idea to ask for a tax increase in a low turnout odd-year election. The people who turn out for such elections skew much older and richer than a midterm or presidential electorate. West Austin will be way overrepresented.
