Following a marathon six-hour public hearing in San Bernardino yesterday the proposal to expand the county fire protection district, FP-5, to more than 19,000 square miles passed yesterday. County supervisors Lovingood and Rutherford opposed the expansion and the associated $157 per parcel fee. Supervisors Gonzales, Hagman, and our own James Ramos voted in support of the measure. More than 60 citizens spoke against the measure and the convoluted process for property owners to oppose it. No one from the public spoke in favor. The expansion and fee were conceived as a bailout measure and permanent solution to county fire‘s $29 million budget shortfall. The plan was widely opposed because it disproportionately burdens low-income property owners and because it was presented as a fee rather than a tax. By calling it a fee, the county was able to skirt the voter approval requirements of prop 218 and instead, devise a convoluted process to oppose the plan. Judging from the vote, the scheme worked as fewer than four percent of property owners (representing 1.9 percent of assessed value) successfully negotiated the protest requirements to have their votes counted. Unless the courts intervene, property owners can expect to see the fee on next year’s property tax bills.
