Permanent sales tax would betray voters

To the editor:

Wasilla Mayor Bert Cottle is holding a special meeting June 29 to ask the city council not to sunset the sales tax used for constructing our new library. Mayor Cottle’s request for a permanent sales tax increase, before the present funding for the library is complete, is disingenuous to our Wasilla residents and supporters of the new Wasilla library.

The mayor’s Ordinance 15-20 has a long wish list of capital projects that have not gone through a vetting process or feasibility study to back them up. The most important issue is that our reputation at the city is now questioned, and our reputation is now tarnished, just by bringing this tax issue forward for consideration.

The mayor, in his action of bringing this forward, has now put doubt into the minds of our constituents. That, in and of itself, is an issue. If our constituents knew this was coming down the pike I don’t believe they would have voted for construction of a new library in October 2013.

As a council member, I worked long and hard with my colleagues to find a balance in how we would fund the library without additional burdens to our citizens. Planning for a new library took many years of work from the Friends of the Library, the Library Steering Committee, and city officials to find the right balance for planning, constructing and financing a new library. It was not an easy task.

At that time, council fought several attempts by Mayor Verne E. Rupright and then city administrator Cottle to push a permanent sales tax increase. Repeatedly, council said no to any permanent sales tax increase. We believed a tax with a sunset clause showed the voters that we were accountable with their hard-earned money. That is why it passed at the ballot box.

I made a promise to sunset this tax. The voters supported the sunset clause. Now we need to honor that vote and the promise we made to the citizens of Wasilla.

Colleen Sullivan-Leonard

Wasilla City Council