Columbia residents will vote on whether or not to renew the 1/8 cent park sales tax Tuesday.
Polls open at 6 a.m and close at 7 p.m., and polling locations can be found at showmeboone.com/clerk/elections/.
Boone County Clerk Brianna Lennon said she is expecting a 10% turnout for the election. The park tax increase for Columbia is the only ballot issue in Boone County.
Lennon said that Boone County has tried to time its community engagement events around the time of the election to try to get a higher turn out. Events like the “I Voted” sticker contest gave younger community members the chance to redesign the “I Voted” sticker, for example.
The sales tax would not be a tax increase, but would extend the 1/8 cent for an additional 10 years, bringing in projected revenue of $30 million over that time period for parks and recreation development.
Columbia’s current sales tax rate is 7.975%; Missouri cities’ rates range between 4.225% and 10.350%.
The current park sales tax is 1/4 of a cent. Within that 1/4 cent, 1/8 is permanent and will always have funds allocated towards parks and recreation. The other 1/8 cent is a renewable sales tax with the current tax set to expire in March.
Columbia residents first voted on the renewable tax to last for five years in 2000. That tax was then renewed in 2005, and again in 2010 for an additional five years each time. In 2015, the tax was renewed for six years.
This year, the city is seeking to get the tax extended for 10 years, which would be the longest extension in the history of the tax.
There are multiple projects that the Parks and Recreation Department has proposed that would be financed by the revenue raised by the tax.
Projects include work on trails, new facility and park development, maintenance of existing trails and structures, and annual funding. Some funds for trail extension will contribute toward completion of the 30-mile trail loop. Half of the project has been completed already, primarily using funds from the 1/8 renewable park sales tax.
A survey done for Columbia by the ETC Institute showed that 86% of those surveyed would be supportive of a renewal of the park sales tax last passed in 2015; 80% of them for 10 more years.
Still, the city has organized groups to drum up support for the tax extension.
Randy Boehm, the co-chair of Friends of Columbia, said that it is sometimes difficult to get people out to vote, especially on days without national issues on the ballot. The sales tax extension is the only question on Tuesday’s ballot.
The process for selecting projects after the election, if the sales tax is extended, will be a very rigorous public hearing process. The timeline for the process is as follows:
The first public hearing process will have citizens fill out comment cards to discuss their support or concern about the projects. Once they come to a consensus, it moves to the next public hearing.
The Parks and Recreation Commission will have another public hearing process where citizens can again voice their concerns. They will make a recommendation for the plan and then move it to the City Council.
City Council will also host the final public hearing, and then authorize the project.
Parks and Recreation will then receive the plan, and then begin the process of bidding.
