A local attorney is pushing yet another change to city law that would limit city leaders’ power to raise taxes.
Attorney Jim Roberts said this week that his group has mailed more than 200,000 petitions to Nashville voters, hoping to get six proposed revisions to the Metro Charter on the ballot in May or June. Last year, Roberts and his team secured the necessary signatures to get a different version of the proposal on the ballot, but a Nashville judge deemed it illegal and said it could not go before Davidson County voters.
This time, Roberts said he has made changes that he believes will help his proposal pass legal review. Among them: The new version limits future tax increases to 3 percent, while the old would have clawed back the increase for the current city budget. Additionally, Roberts added specific citations to the Metro Charter; lawyers and experts said his previous version could not be added to the charter without declaring where each item should go and what it should replace in the existing charter. He also added severability clauses to some of the provisions — when the previous iteration was in court, the judge said she could not unilaterally remove some parts of the proposed charter revision without severability language.
Roberts’ proposed revisions:
- Limit property tax rate increases to an annual maximum of 3 percent and set rates for 2021-22 and 2022-23 at the rate before last year’s increase
- Make it easier to recall elected city officials by reducing the number of signatures required on a recall petition, and add a new rule that recalled officials cannot run in the recall election
- Abolish lifetime benefits, like health insurance, for elected officials
- Protect voter-initiated charter amendments from revisions
- Require a Metro Council supermajority, rather than a simple majority, to transfer city property, and require a city referendum for property transfers valued at more than $5 million
- Claw back city land if a professional sports franchise stops competing for more than two years
“The bottom line is people are not happy about this," Roberts says. "It’s not like I'm trying to sell them something they don't want. Most people in this town think this is outrageous, they think it's irresponsible, and they want these changes. … There's going to be a vote. There's no way Metro is going to be able to stop all six of these. They shouldn't be able to stop any of them, but there's going to be an election.”
Despite Roberts’ changes, legal and political challenges remain. Opponents cite state law that gives the Metro Council authority over tax rates. Additionally, critics question whether it would be legal to change the law related to sports stadium deals and apply those changes to deals that have already been finalized, like Nashville SC’s. Also, the line item related to city officials’ benefits appears to some to be too vague. Roberts says he expects the matter to go to court again.
That’s not to mention the fiscal problems city leaders say Roberts’ proposed changes would cause. (Roberts declined to name his financial backers.)
“If we think our departments are strained now in providing services for a rapidly growing city, it would make it even worse,” says Metro Councilmember Tanaka Vercher, a member and past chair of the Budget and Finance Committee. “If neighbors think response times now are long, it would be even worse. It would be catastrophic for the delivery of services. It would set the city back.”
Vercher says she believes city officials have done “a terrible job” communicating with constituents about the cost of city services, but that people should see the impact of Mayor John Cooper’s proposed capital spending plan. The plan includes hundreds of millions of dollars in new projects and maintenance, including a new southeast police precinct Vercher says her constituents are eager for.
Metro employee representatives also warned against the effects of the proposal.
“Signing this petition means signing onto closing your community parks, community centers, libraries and fire stations,” says Brad Rayson, president of SEIU Local 205, which represents some Metro government, Metro Nashville Public Schools and Metro General Hospital workers. “It will cause drastic cuts in city services and cripple our school system. Anyone who cares about the city of Nashville should not sign this petition."
Cooper’s team and Metro councilmembers are already at work on next year’s budget. If Roberts’ proposal were to pass in May or June, the budget process could be upended as city leaders scramble to comply with its strictures before the start of the new fiscal year in July.
“The consensus I got from my constituents was that they were not happy about paying a higher tax bill, but they understood why,” says Metro Councilmember Kyonztè Toombs, chair of the Budget and Finance Committee. “But they are very much expecting the services that go along with that higher tax rate.”
