Rancho P.V. Looks to Parcel Tax to Ease Budget Woes : Finances: Voters will face the choice between a $200 annual levy for four years or a drastic cut in services resulting from a $2.4-million shortfall.

The Rancho Palos Verdes City Council, warning that a severe budget crisis may force more cutbacks in city services, has voted unanimously to put a deficit-busting $3-million-a-year tax increase on the April 14 municipal election ballot.

If approved, property owners would pay a $200 annual real estate parcel tax that will eliminate a $2.4-million shortfall in the budget and restore some maintenance and construction money in this financially strapped city on the affluent Palos Verdes Peninsula, officials said.

The exact language of the ballot measure is being worked out and will get final approval in a special council meeting set for Saturday at City Hall. The hard-pressed council is rushing to meet a Jan. 17 deadline to get the measure on the ballot.

If all goes as expected, the voters will be given a simple “yes” or “no” choice on a proposed ordinance establishing the special tax. If approved by a simple majority, the four-year tax will automatically expire in June, 1996.

The last time a tax issue was put to the voters of this upscale bedroom community of 42,000 was June, 1988. On a close vote, they rejected the continuation of a 5% utility tax.

“Hopefully, the city will get behind us on this measure and promote the tax,” Mayor John C. McTaggart said. Without additional revenue, the city’s future is bleak, he said.

“We can’t print money, you know,” McTaggart said.

Faced with a 34% deficit in the $7-million budget next year, the council has already cut services and is considering laying off an additional 10% of the work force.

City financial analysts have also trimmed $242,000 from the parks and recreation maintenance budget, eliminated $737,000 from public works and lopped off $150,000 that would have gone to repair landslide damage in the Portuguese Bend area.

So far, no organized opposition to the tax has appeared. Most of the people in the small crowd at Tuesday night’s meeting were there to protest cuts in park and recreation programs and to support the proposed tax.

The council last week had proposed eliminating all spring classes and activities run by the Parks and Recreation Department. When that stirred up a storm of protest, the programs were quickly restored.

However, fitness, recreation, handicraft and art classes will now cost more. The council voted unanimously to raise fees by 5% and to add a $10 non-resident charge for participants from other cities.

The council also decided to keep open the gift shop in the Point Vicente Visitor Center, but the center staff will be cut to one full-time position, officials said.

The council was unanimous in its message to the voters: If they reject the parcel tax, the city will be forced to shut down many more government services.

Without the anticipated $3 million the new tax would generate, the city’s badly run-down streets, curbs, gutters and storm drains will go unrepaired, environmental protection services will be reduced or eliminated and recreation programs will be cut further, council members said.

“We have serious, serious deficit problems,” Councilwoman Susan Brooks said. “We have to pass this tax and get back to a pay-as-you-go situation. That is the only way we can survive.”