“All we want are the facts, ma’am.”
— Sgt. Joe Friday, a character in the classic TV show, ‘Dragnet.’
A year ago, the Archuleta Board of County Commissioners gave us a terrible tax increase proposal — a one-percent sales tax increase for 14 years — aimed at funding a new jail, a new Sheriff’s admin building, and who knows what other “Justice System” additions. (They wouldn’t tell us what, exactly, they planned to do with all the money.)
The 2017 plan was endorsed by the weekly Pagosa Springs SUN.
This year, we have a nearly identical proposal on the ballot. A one-percent sales tax increase, but now for 15 years instead of 14 years… and a promise to build a new jail and Sheriff Office, and then to spend the rest of the money on… well, they aren’t telling us. Again.
So, since the BOCC is once again fielding the SAME terrible plan, I’ve decided to run the SAME editorial as I posted last year. The dollar amounts are slightly different this year, but I have NOT changed the names to protect the innocent. To wit:
I had attended the September 19, 2017 presentation by local advocates of ballot measure 1A — hosted by activists Carol and Carl Mellberg and held at the Ross Aragon Community Center. The goal of the presentation was to convince the voting public to support a 14-year, one-percent sales tax increase so the County could leave most of the existing Courthouse vacant, while spending up to $26.6 million on a much larger Sheriff’s Office and Detention Center.
I counted about 30 potential voters in the audience. That’s about 0.3 percent of the registered voters in the county. Not a bad turnout, considering.
The Mellbergs and their fellow tax-increase supporters advertised another, similar presentation for Thursday, October 19, in a much larger venue — the Archuleta County Extension Building. The organizers stated that they hoped for a large turnout, drawing from the 99.7 percent of voters who had not attended the September 19 presentation.
Their advertisement in the weekly Pagosa Springs SUN had promised us:
“The county commissioners will be present to answer your questions.”
Here’s how last Thursday’s event appeared, as moderator Jim Huffman stepped up to the microphone to welcome the voters in the audience.
I counted about 24 potential voters in attendance, not including the event organizers. I didn’t notice any “county commissioners” among them…
…and since I had been told that the presentation would be essentially identical to the September 19 event, and since I’d been told that the audience would not be able to ask questions of the speakers, I headed home to work on my next Daily Post article.
Another person I had not noticed at either of these Tax Increase events was Terri House, the editor and publisher of the weekly Pagosa Springs SUN. The SUN and the Daily Post might be called ‘competitors’ on a certain level, in that we both make an effort to publish timely and accurate news about our little community of Pagosa Springs and we both sell advertising to support that effort. In the case of Ms. House and myself, we both have concerns about government transparency — and the potential for government corruption, whenever the Fourth Estate (the news media) is sleeping on the job.
Ms. House regularly posts an editorial on Page 2 of the weekly SUN, and last week she addressed Ballot Measure 1A. The editorial bore the headline:
“Vote yes for a new jail and sheriff’s office”
I fully agree with the first word in the above headline: “Vote…” I support the idea of voting, and my hat is off to anyone who makes an effort to encourage public participation in democratic elections.
But the second word… “yes”? Clearly, Ms. House and I were on opposite sides of the 1A tax increase question.
In her op-ed piece, Ms. House quoted a state law, CRS 17-26-101. “There shall be maintained in each county in this state, at the expense of the county, a county jail for the detention, safekeeping and confinement of prisoners lawfully committed.”
Her editorial then went on to imply that Archuleta County does not have a jail. In fact, we do have a jail. We have an abandoned jail, that our BOCC and our County Sheriff have steadfastly refused to renovate since April 2015 — preferring instead to put Archuleta taxpayers $26.6 million in debt to build a brand new facility twice the size of the abandoned jail.
Ms. House also wrote:
“For someone who might think the proposed jail is too big, remember that around 2002, back when we had a 32-bed jail, that facility was overflowing and we were having to house prisoners elsewhere. A 54-bed jail is not too far-fetched for a community that is growing like ours…”
Some of our readers may have noticed that Archuleta County has changed a bit since “around 2002.” For one thing, the criminal justice system, all across the nation, has become more efficient and economical, through the use of alternative sentencing — the use of ankle-monitors and other tracking methods that keep non-dangerous offenders out of our increasing expensive jails.
Here in our own little community, less than half of our current offenders are locked up; the rest are managed with alternative methods — much less expensive methods. Such as electronic ankle bracelets.
Back in 2003, when we were often housing more than 32 inmates in the Archuleta County jail, the actual expenditures for operating the jail were $749,900. Ten years later, in 2013, when — according to Undersheriff Tonya Hamilton — we were housing an average of 12.1 inmates per day, the actual cost of operating our existing jail was $1.1 million. (Source: Archuleta County budgets.)
Ms. House may not have noticed these facts? She also may not have noticed that, back in 2002, Archuleta County was actually “a community that is growing like ours.” During the ten years between 1992 and 2002, the county population had basically doubled, from 5,725 to 10,951. (US Census data.)
Over the past decade — between 2007 and 2016 — the population of Archuleta County grew by a total of 375 people, from 12,479 to 12,854. (US Census data.)
Much of Ms. House’s editorial focused on the hazards presented by transporting Archuleta County inmates back and forth to Durango — the result of the refusal by the BOCC and the Sheriff to quickly renovate and improve our existing 9,500 square foot jail facility, which has plenty of space to accommodate, say, an average of 12.1 inmates per day.
“These deputies are mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, daughters and sons with families who need them,” she writes.
Neither I, nor anyone else I know, wants our deputies transporting inmates through “isolated rural areas late at night where cellphone coverage is nonexistent for miles and miles.” We all want a jail, here in our own community.
And we already have a jail facility here in our own community. But it sits vacant and in poor repair. By purchasing the huge vacant lot adjacent to the Courthouse, the Sheriff and BOCC could have plenty of room to expand in the future, should the need arise. I would personally jump at the chance to raise my taxes to pay for that $600,000 property purchase — if it would save us all $20 million that could be better spent elsewhere.
But that’s not an option the County has given us. Our only option is to vote ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ on a new $26.6 million debt.
If Ms. House had given us all the facts, instead of only a select few, we might have been better-informed voters.
