Tuesday Tax Vote Could Decide Future of Desert Hot Springs

A special election Tuesday will decide the fate of this beleaguered Coachella Valley city, its leaders say: financial recovery that could put it on a par with posh neighboring communities--or disaster.

Voters will cast ballots on two tax measures that are crucial to the city’s survival. Beset for years by financial problems, the city of 15,000 is $2.2 million in debt and has $20,000 in the bank.

Without the $1.8 million in annual revenue that the tax measures would provide, the city will have to cut its $3.7-million budget nearly in half, disband its new and successful Police Department and probably declare bankruptcy. So dire is the mood in town that some speak of disincorporation, a step almost unprecedented in California.

“If those measures fail, we would no doubt have to seek Chapter 9 bankruptcy, because we would not have enough money to pay our creditors, let alone pay for public protection,” Mayor Matt Weyuker said.

“To say I’m not a little bit apprehensive, I’d be kidding you,” he said. “But I’m cautiously optimistic. I think people in this town want their Police Department and don’t want to lose what they have.”

Like most of the city’s top officials, Weyuker is new, recently elected by residents who are tired of the crisis. He believes voters will approve the tax measures to support the new leaders. “It’s my feeling that the citizens of this community elected us to turn the ship around,” Weyuker said.

Measure E would levy a $97 annual parcel tax that would raise $1.1 million a year to allow the city’s Police Department to remain in business. Measure F calls for a five-year extension of a 5% utility tax--which otherwise will expire June 30--to generate $680,000 a year to cover city debt payments and other basic services, officials said.

Intervention by Crisis Team

No organized opposition has formed to either measure, but many voters--though generally supportive--remain doubtful.

“They said it’s for better police protection, but then we hear they’re using it to pay off the debt,” said 86-year-old retiree Leah Lewis, expressing puzzlement about the purpose of the two taxes. “So we are confused. But we want better police protection. We’re between the devil and the deep blue sea.”

A neglected neighbor of Palm Springs and other affluent retirement communities, Desert Hot Springs has long been afflicted by blight and fiscal turmoil. The city’s administrative staff has been so depleted that a crisis team supplied by Riverside County swept in this March to fill key administrative positions.

The crisis staff came in at the City Council’s request and serves at no cost to Desert Hot Springs. “The county’s municipal response team is doing some of the things the city would do for itself if it had the cash, but they don’t,” said interim City Manager Rob Parkins, a deputy county chief executive officer who previously managed the cities of Palm Springs and Miami Beach.

At the root of the city’s troubles is crime, many officials say. It was patrolled for years by two Riverside County sheriff’s units, and the response time for high-priority crimes sometimes lagged at 17 to 25 minutes, Weyuker said.

That made the city attractive to crooks and anathema to business. Growth was stunted while crime soared.

In an effort to reverse the trend, city leaders formed their own Police Department three years ago--a move that has cut crime rates and raised civic spirits.

Things have been looking up on the development front, as well. Half a dozen projects--including one 2,100-home complex surrounding a pair of golf courses--have been proposed.

Today, however, seven of 27 positions in the city’s new Police Department are vacant. Nervous officers took jobs with surrounding law enforcement agencies in anticipation of the department’s demise, and no new officers have replaced them, Parkins said.

“We are not having any success at all recruiting, because there is the obvious concern about signing on with a city that may not be a going concern,” Parkins said.

Selling a new and an extended tax could be tough in a city whose median income hovers around $17,000, Parkins acknowledged.

Residents say they are skeptical about putting more money into the hands of a government that mismanaged it in the past.

“I’m sorry that the city officials were so stupid to get into this in the first place,” said retiree Norman Kirschbaum, 74. “They were certainly negligent and uninformed and dug themselves into a hole and now we have to get out. But it’s vitally important that we keep the Police Department.”

Many residents agree that keeping the city running, and keeping the new Police Department afloat, is worth the expense.

“I want to save the city of Desert Hot Springs,” said Michael Laurence, a 42-year-old handyman. “I hope they don’t waste this chance. I like the police force, the security of it, the class the city’s getting. I didn’t want to come over here a few years ago. Now I own a house on the hill. I’d hate to see us go down.”

Norbert Lewandowski, 45, said the fates of companies like his landscaping firm are intimately tied to the two tax measures’ success. Without new revenue to pay for police services, the city would lack the stability to attract new businesses and sustain old ones, he said.

“We need to support the tax for the growth and future of Desert Hot Springs,” he said.