And Why Sales Tax Won’t Fix It – Nearly two weeks ago, in a decision that occurred after midnight, the council ultimately at almost the 13th hour decided to go with a six-year, half-cent sales tax. I would be remiss at the start not to point out that the city council has an incredibly low batting average on decisions made after midnight.
A few weeks ago, I came out against the tax hike, but it is really more complicated than some sort of opposition to increased taxes. As I will argue here, the city council violated the prime directive of revenue hikes – ask for what you need. They did not and it is not even close. Instead, they are counting a second tax hike, in November, that will require a two-thirds majority to get them the rest of the way.
Will they get it? I do not know. On the one hand, since I have been following city politics closely, no ballot measure on taxes got less than 67 percent approval. That was the 2011 Measure A – an election campaign that was marred by several critical mistakes that created distrust with the school district and an unusual amount of negative press.
On the other hand, a parcel tax in November has several things going against it. First, it will be the second tax increase the city asks for in six months. Second, there is a total landscape picture that it will operate in. In addition to the parcel tax, you have water rate hikes that will increase people’s water costs two to three times their 2013 amount by the year 2018. You have the $400 or so that the district collects in parcel taxes.
We also have a great deal of uncertainty. We will have a new city council and a new city manager by then and that presents a lot of unknown. Moreover, we are flying blind. The school district, for all of their problems, has always polled to see what the voters are willing to support. The city council is flying into this blind and they are rolling the dice on what could be half a billion in roads maintenance costs down the line.
The major problem has been a policy problem – a failure of the council first to take the issue seriously and second to implement funding in the face of other budgetary demands. In 2009, when Bob Clarke first presented the roadway problem, the city might have been able to have dealt with the roads crisis for a few million per year.
But, instead, those councils, facing budget shortfalls and failing to prioritize infrastructure, pushed the problem down the road, ignoring the issue of lack of funding in 2009 and 2010.
This chart shows the situation clearly
https://davisvanguard.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/paving-contracts-2000-2012.png
Since 2000, the city of Davis has spent a little over $10 million on roads, and only half a million of that was budgeted money from the general fund. Everything else came from state and federal funds, which were never consistent or reliable.
It was not until 2011, with a new council, that the city council finally started taking this impending crisis seriously.
But even the post-2010 city council has failed to deal with the problem.
In June 2011, the council made huge waves by reducing city employee compensation by $2.5 million. $1 million of that was to go to roads – a drop in the bucket, but a huge step forward. However, those cuts were never implemented and thus the $1 million never ended up in the roads fund.
In the 2012-13 budget, the city council, anticipating the new MOUs, again budgeted $1 million for roads, but again that was never spent.
The 2013-14 budget called for $2.3 million to be put toward street maintenance, but $1 million of that was money budgeted from 2012-13 that was carried over.
So when the council reduced the sales tax from three-quarters of a cent to one half cent, reducing the revenue from $5.4 million to $3.6 million, the reduction would of course occur in roads funding, which was reduced from $2.5 million to $1 million.
Council reasoned that the reason we want to make these cuts is that the real funding mechanism for roads will be the November Parcel Tax. There are clear advantages of it. The city can borrow money off of the parcel tax in the form of general obligation bonds that can front money for roads.
The problem, of course, is that the council has to get a November parcel tax passed by the voters, and as we argued above that is a tall order, particularly given that they are already asking voters to approve a sales tax measure.
How bad is the situation with the roadways? It is probably the worst crisis facing the city today.
It was a year ago we learned that if the city council did not immediately infuse tens of millions into road maintenance and spend $150 million, they would be facing a $444 million deferred maintenance hole.
“We knew at the time it was a very difficult vote to basically move $1 million into the roads and $200,000 into the bike paths,” Mayor Pro Tem Dan Wolk said at the time. “That was a difficult vote and we knew at the time… that that really wasn’t going to solve the problem by any means.”
“But seeing this report shows you how really a drop in the bucket it really is,” he said. “It’s very daunting and sobering to realize and think about where we’re going to find this $150 million.”
It is actually worse than that, as the real cost is perhaps closer to $600 million and it is rising fast.
And that is the part that needs to vex people.
https://davisvanguard.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Roads-May-2013-02.jpg
First of all, the costs of asphalt have increased eight-fold since 1999. That means that the costs are increasing much faster than the pace of ordinary inflation.
Second, as the mayor and others explained in the State of the City address, the cost of deferred maintenance is exponential. At relatively reasonable levels of pavement, the cost is “only” $9 per square yard, but that increases quickly to $22 per square yard if that road is not repaired and it increases to $61 per square yard at the point where the roadways are near failure – and unfortunately many are near failure in the city.
The problem is so vexing now that the only way to properly handle it is to take out $25 million in bonds and pump in a couple of million a year thereafter for the next 30 years. And in so doing, we can keep our average road at a PCI (Pavement Condition Index) of 60, which seems like a D-grade.
No longer can we strive as a community for a PCI of 70. That is too expensive and too ambitious. The best we can hope for is that the main roads in town can be kept at 68 with residential streets far lower than that. Even that may be too much to ask for.
The council deserves great credit in starting to address issues that previous councils have ignored, but the fact remains that very little money has been spent since the council first took over in 2010, since the new council in 2011 passed the first major budgetary reform, and now when, once again, the can has been kicked to November.
At best, council is taking a major gamble that they can get a second tax measure passed in November; at worst, we are looking to add literally millions and probably tens of millions to the taxpayer’s tab when roads finally get addressed.
This is what happens when the council waits until after the midnight hour in the council meeting where a June tax measure must be placed on the ballot.
However, it is not too late to fix this. Staff believes that council has until March 11 to pull the sales tax measure off the ballot. They could then find a means to balance the immediate budget in June while planning a single parcel tax measure in November with a full community discussion.
That would be the best approach at this time because, again, two tax measures are going to be difficult to get approved.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Are you kidding David, cancelling the sales tax will cause the parcel tax to go even higher. We can’t just keep piling taxes on the homeowners because many are reaching the breaking point. At least a sales tax invloves everyone in the city to pay a little more, just relying on parcel taxes puts all the burden on homeowners.
“Are you kidding David, cancelling the sales tax will cause the parcel tax to go even higher. ”
Yes, I’m looking to fund what needs to be funded, not cut taxes.
“We can’t just keep piling taxes on the homeowners because many are reaching the breaking point. ”
How much do you think you’ll end up paying in increased car maintenance if the roads are failing?
“Yes, I’m looking to fund what needs to be funded, not cut taxes.”
What are you talking about, you’re already advocating for stopping the new .5% sales tax.
“How much do you think you’ll end up paying in increased car maintenance if the roads are failing?”
What I’m saying is we should implement a combination of a sales tax and a parcel tax as the way to go, not just one large parcel tax that just homeowners end up getting burdened with.
I’ll try to calculate how much we are talking about adding to what the city is proposing.
I’m looking to change the form and the amount of the tax because the half cent sales tax doesn’t do what we need it to do.
David wrote:
> How much do you think you’ll end up paying in increased car
> maintenance if the roads are failing?
If the roads get worse we will have people trading in their Hybrids for SUVs that can take the rough terrain (the Davis bike trails already have so many bumps that a full suspension mtn. bike makes for a much better ride than a road bike).
Maybe we will see more vehicles like the one below in Davis in a few years:
http://garagemahals.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/six_wheeled_mercedes_g_class_g63_amg_6x6_is_the_largest_and_most_extreme_road_legal_suv_wrh9o.jpg
This makes no sense to me. “…find a means…”? Huh?
They should not pull the sales tax.
My concern is that passing the sales tax in June, will mean they can’t pass a parcel tax later in the year.
So you oppose the current sales tax proposal because it isn’t high enough, yet you think passing the lower amount will make it harder to pass a parcel tax later. So you want to propose a higher sales tax, and a parcel tax, to be on the same ballot later, because you think that combination has a better chance of passage? Again: this doesn’t make sense.
I should note that you have a long record of thinking things (water rates, etc.) are going to make it more difficult to get parcel taxes to pass. I think taxes of any kind will pass if the voters are given sufficient information and trust the council and city manager to use the funds honestly. So really, it’s going to depend on how well staff presents the information and how the city council election goes in terms of sticking to the issues.
“So you oppose the current sales tax proposal because it isn’t high enough, yet you think passing the lower amount will make it harder to pass a parcel tax later. So you want to propose a higher sales tax, and a parcel tax, to be on the same ballot later, because you think that combination has a better chance of passage? Again: this doesn’t make sense. ”
It doesn’t make sense or you don’t agree? Right now the plan is to put a sales tax on the ballot for June – I assume that will pass. Then put a parcel tax on the ballot for November. It has a higher threshold and is the second city tax. I think that will be a tough sell and without getting the second parcel tax passed, we are in bad shape.
I do think at some point the residents in Davis will not support additional rate hikes. Water was a close call. If water had required a two-thirds vote, it would have gone down. How can you categorically state that a parcel tax will not go down? And now to add to that, the city manager who is by far the best communicator – when engaged – who is going to carry the message forward?
Bottom line, the sales tax not happening will cause us to lay some employees off. I would represent not to have to do that, but not passing the parcel tax in the fall will have far more dire consequences.
A quick back of the envelope estimate of number of layoffs need to achieve 5 million dollars in budget reduction is 30-40.
Sounds draconian.
Remember we’re only talking about $2.5 million in budget reduction because $2.5 million of the deficit was going to roads.
Ok, 15 – 20 layoffs… probably half of who are primary ‘bread-winners’… still stiff.
What do you think happens if a second tax fails in November?
My understanding is that parcel tax could not be used for operating expenses. Am I incorrect?
One thing you are missing here David. The parcel tax will have a more direct connection to things that residents care about. They might be grumpy about it, but when you explain roads, pools, buildings, etc. They should get it. The problem with increase taxes to fund city operations is that a lot of people have grown incensed about the obscene pay and benefits… including pensions. So, the sales tax increase might actually be the harder sell, IMO.
You have a good point that I would agree with if it weren’t for the 50+1 versus 66.66+1 vote requirements.
I agree… a parcel tax is likely to fail if one cent goes to anything other than infrastructure (based on the 2/3 criteria). What David is advocating is putting a parcel tax on the ballot that would require the City to completely freeze, if not decrease operating costs, and if utility costs go up, basic operating equipment, etc., employees will have to be laid off, and likely have to absorb any costs due to inflation, medical, PERS, etc. as well. The only way that could be mitigated to any extent, would to be a sales tax increase.
Agree. Get accurate information to people and let them decide. I have faith that a a sales tax, and parcel measure can pass if people understand what the finical situation is, and what the consequences of not passing it would be.
Has it occurred to you that if the parcel tax has to go higher because the sales tax gets cancelled that the parcel tax might be much harder to pass?
It’s a basic calculation. Which is harder – two taxes with the two thirds vote going second or one tax slightly larger with a single two thirds vote?
Except the sales tax levy would be a 50% + 1 vote. Talk about ‘conflating’.
That was my point.
read too fast… acknowledged.
Only first four words were intended…. rest was a vestige of a previous post that I did NOT intend to re-post… stuff happens.
If the point of crafting tax legislation is make it easier to pass, and not to ask for what we need to cover our cost, then it would be more logical to go with a higher sales tax that requires a simple majority and a lower parcel tax that requires 2/3 approval to pass.
Think David is looking forward to layoffs AND the erosion of benefits and/or take home pay for City employees.
I once had a Cal Trans planner tell me that if you let the roads crumble people will stop driving so much 🙂
We can go back to horses.
That would draw tourists! And think of the organic by-products. Locally-bagged horse manure!
Or we can all purchase big 4-wheel drive monster trucks with colorful paint jobs and lots of chrome. That would also draw some tourists!
But it would not help generate any fertilizer.
Maybe Robb can just gives us rides on his bike.
I’m sure he would, but the bikes have it even worse. THAT is why the road maintenance problem drives me nuts – my car handles it fine. But on bike? The road becomes a slalom course to dodge the obstacles.
I learned not to put anything of value in my bike basket since the time a hit one of these obstacles and my phone flew out and cracked on the uneven pot hole filled bike path pavement.
“But it would not help generate any fertilizer.”
Oh but you’re wrong, there will be plenty of crap coming out of the local environmentalist’s mouths when they see all the monster trucks around town.
LOL! LOL! LOL!
It took three “LOL”s before the VG would let me post.
I’m pretty sure we’ll have a bumper crop of bovine manure this year, given the races for CC, Assembly, Judge and school board.
I’m going to go under the assumption that most of the members of this community are reasonable people, who when presented with factual information will make reasonable decisions. The challenge is getting factual information to voters so that they are basing their decisions on this instead of half truths and lies. If council and city staff figure out a way to do this my guess is that they will have no problem passing both a sales tax this spring and a parcel tax in the fall.
So, David, let me get this straight…
Kill the sales tax measure in June because it will cause the parcel tax measure in November to fail. Instead put all the tax increase needs… both the general fund operating deficit and the deficit for deferred infrastructure maintenance… on the November ballot as a larger parcel tax?
Do I have that correct?
You do know that a parcel tax increase requires a 2/3 vote, and a sales tax increase is 50%+1, right?
If I were running odds of the probability of greater or lesser fiscal calamity resulting from a failure of tax increase measures, I would not take your approach.
I will admit though… I am still a little dumbfounded for why the Council came back with a .5 cent sales tax increase instead of the .75 cent number that had been determined to cover the entire general fund operating deficit. I set through a few meetings and read a number of documents that made this clear. Does the city and Council know of something else we can easily cut to make up the remaining gap (assuming the sale tax increase passes).
One thing that was made clear to Brett and Dan in the revenue workshops was to ask for what was needed so the city did not again have to come back and ask for more. The other thing that was made clear… make the increases temporary… no more than 10 years… and focus on economic development for revenue replacement.
Did these opinions represent the majority? My sense is that they did and still do once the population is fully educated on the city’s fiscal situation. There will always be a group of extreme, stubborn, change-averse voters that leave their calculator locked away and cover their ears saying “neener, neener, neener” when being explained these things. But, given my chats with the average person, they don’t want the city to crumble any more than it has and are willing to support a temporary set of taxes as long as we grow our local economy to the point of being able to pay our bills.
One last thing… I think that the schools are probably going to come back for a third parcel tax increase demand at some point. That being the case, I suggest we keep any other parcel tax increase as small as possible or else we increase the probability that the next school tax will fail. You know that this would not upset me too much, but it would others in town.
Frankly should I be concerned that I agree with most everything you wrote? I’m I starting to think like you or are you starting to think like me? I’m not sure which I find more disconcerting.
I believe that business’ were concerned that a .75 cent increase would result in Davis having the highest sales tax in our local region, and that this would negatively impact their business’. I don’t know enough to judge wether or not this a legitimate concern but it may be one of the reasons council went with the lower number.
As I wrote in The Enterprise, the best tax to fix the roads is a tax on gasoline and diesel. A 6 cent per gallon tax would increase the purchase price by roughly 1.7%. That would generate a little more than $1 billion per year for cities and counties to repair their roads. Unfortunately, I don’t think the legislature really cares to solve this problem. And cities and counties have no authority to raise a fuels tax. (Also, if one locality did, that would motivate marginal customers to purchase fuel at the next town or county over.)
http://www.davisenterprise.com/forum/opinion-columns/why-we-need-a-local-gas-tax/
So with a fuels tax unlikely, the next best alternative is a bonded ad valorem tax on property. Prop 13 allows local governments to raise the property tax over 1% of assessed value, if the revenues generated will pay off a bond. This is far more fair than a new parcel tax.
If Davis needs (for example) $50 million over the next 25 years, and it can sell a bond at 4.86564% interest, the ad valorem tax would have to be set so that it raises $3.5 million per year. Obviously, if we want $100 million, the tax would have to be set twice as high.
I think it is important to understand that bad roads will lower property values and they inevitably cause serious damage to cars and trucks driving on them. From my column: “According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, Californians are now spending $13.9 billion per year on car repairs and operating costs, caused by the woeful conditions of our roads. That’s $586 per driver.”
So you suggest yet ANOTHER California gasoline tax increase in a state that was designed for the automobile and already has the highest gasoline tax.
And then you suggest a ad valorem tax because it is “more fair”?
I think you are leaving out the fact that outside of bicycle heaven Davis, the rest of the world has to drive their cars to schools and to their places of employment. And any gasoline increase will hit the most vulnerable of those people the hardest.
The problem with an ad valorem tax is its complexity. You will lose many voters just because they can’t understand it and they vote no due to the complexity. Others will vote no because it penalized people simply because of longevity for staying in one location… and many of these are fixed-income people.
We need to consider the value of the KISS principle.
This in and of itself is problem. Maybe we should raise the tax on gas and invest in better public transpiration and other alternative transpiration methods. Probably a better long term investment.
Rich wrote:
> According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, Californians
> are now spending $13.9 billion per year on car repairs and operating
> costs, caused by the woeful conditions of our roads.
> That’s $586 per driver.”
I’m all for better roads, but the $586 “per driver per year” number sounds WAY WAY high. I’ve owned 20+ cars and trucks over the past 30+ years (all used and most with over 100K) and I don’t think I have spent $586 TOTAL in suspension repairs and service in all 30 years (I’ve only paid for one alignment and had a pot hole take out one rim).
I’m wondering if anyone else out there is spending $500+ year after year on their cars due to damage from bad roads.
P.S. I’ve owned my current 15 year old daily driver for almost 10 years and I have not spent a penny on road related damage (original shocks, original suspension, original wheels and I’ve only bought one set of tires in just under 100K miles since I ride my bikes a lot)
I think maybe the study was for all those tin and plastic baby cars that Europeans like to drive. My Ford and GMC can handle the potholes. Although I would rather that they be repaired.
Same here, that number is greatly exagerated.
SOUTH, I think the average per car number is high due to wrecks caused by drivers swerving to avoid potholes. I’ve never had an accident of that sort. But if you take a car here and a car there, each worth say $30,000, the average goes up a lot. More likely for most people is what recently happened to me in Sacramento. I was driving at night and (I think) the sidewall of my back right tire caught the edge of a fairly deep pothole. I felt the impact when that happened. However, I didn’t realize I had a flat for another 4-5 blocks. So–partly as a result of my not pulling over immediately–my tire was irreparable; and it cost me (with tax and labor) $120 to replace the tire the next day. Fortunately, my Camry comes with a nice, full-sized spare, and that got him home to Davis without incident.
But for an issue like tire damage, it does not have to be a blow-out to assign some of the problem to roads. It’s also the case that tires which should give you 60,000 miles–say $500 for a set of four–only give you 45,000, because they wear out faster driving on cracked roads. So if you drive your car for 180,000 miles–most don’t, but that number makes this example work–instead of spending $1,500 on tires over that period, you would spend $2,000.
Rich wrote:
> SOUTH, I think the average per car number is
> high due to wrecks caused by drivers swerving
> to avoid potholes.
Even if we include the portion covered by wrecks the numbers still don’t make any sense… The only thing I can think of is that Engineers are creating some kind of formula that calculates the “extra” wear on a car driving on a rough road vs. a smooth road and puts a cost on it despite the fact that almost no one actually “pays” the cost. I found my sister a nice used Acrua Integra about 20 years ago with 70K on it. She drove it hard for about 10 years and when she donated it to charity with 220K miles (and using a quart of oil every 300 miles) it was not as “tight” as the day I first test drove it with “only” 70K but she never spent a penny due to road damage, but I’m sure that when her car went to the scrap yard like 90%+ of all cars that have covered that many miles her suspension had more “wear” that a similar car that just lapped a smooth race track at 30 mph for 220K miles…
> I’ve never had an accident of that sort. But if you take
> a car here and a car there, each worth say $30,000,
> the average goes up a lot.
Just about everyone with a car worth $30K has insurance and if many people were getting hit by “drivers swerving to avoid potholes” (and causing close to $500/year damage on average) the collision portion of coverage would not be less than $200/year for most people.
> More likely for most people is what recently happened to
> me in Sacramento. I was driving at night and (I think) the
> sidewall of my back right tire caught the edge of a fairly
> deep pothole. I felt the impact when that happened.
> However, I didn’t realize I had a flat for another 4-5 blocks.
> So–partly as a result of my not pulling over immediately–my
> tire was irreparable; and it cost me (with tax and labor)
> $120 to replace the tire the next day.
How many times has this happened to you in the past 30 years? At three times at $120 a tire (keeping in mind you were probably paying under $50/tire like most people in the 80’s) we are up to $12/year and you still need to find an extra $574 of damage this year and next year. Thinking back to my one rim that was bent by a pot hole I just remembered that it bent the rim but I didn’t actually buy a new one because it still held air (I only found out it was bent a couple months later when I did a brake job and rotated the tires front to back and the flat spot in the rim that didn’t hit anything on the rear with a drum brake was hitting the front caliper).
> It’s also the case that tires which should give you 60,000 miles–
> say $500 for a set of four–only give you 45,000, because they
> wear out faster driving on cracked roads.
Even if this were true (and it is not) at 15K/year we are only at a difference of $30/year and we still have a LONG LONG way to go to get over $500 (every year).
P.S. I’m embarrassed to admit how many tire “tech sessions” I’ve sat through over the years and how many long tire (and oil) threads I’ve read through on automotive e-mail lists and newsgroups. There is a slight difference in tire wear with rough roads but not much (most severe tire wear is caused by driver error that puts the car way out of alignment like slamming a curb hard when parking or slamming a curb real hard when spinning donuts in an empty parking lot)…
SOUTH, my source for that number was from an LA Times news article. However, I found this study from the ASCE which gets into its methodology if it interests you:
http://www.asce.org/uploadedFiles/Infrastructure/Report_Card/ASCE-FailureToActFinal.pdf
How are other communities dealing with these infrastructure issues? Davis can’t be the only city with ‘deferred maintenance’ budget problems.
Bond measures.
And we need some tax as debt-service / collateral for a bond unless we want to pay a much higher rate. Correct?
Another revenue option would be to become a charter City, place a measure on the ballot for a local income tax, which would probably be passed with the support of students who have (generally) little income, and if there was threshold below which no tax was imposed, could get a lot of lower income voters as well.
Then say bye bye to many of those that would otherwise live here and pay taxes… including me and my company.
Just develop the damn economy to be in par with other comparable cities in CA, and the problems are solved… assuming politicians don’t screw it up again and pay off their union campaign contributors.
Since we flat out do not have the money for the roads and will not for a long time, a 2 pronged approach is needed. Right now we need the band-aid approach, FILL THE HOLES as they appear. Then we need a good balance of when to put on new layers after we have saved up some money for it and gotten funds from the other sources. And if that means we have to wait ’til the new layers cost more, so be it.
As for taxing ourselves, as others have already stated, if we are informed of how much is needed for what in a responsible manner, we will raise the money. If we lack reasons to trust the assessments, such as David inflating the costs to $600 million, we will vote no.
david didn’t inflate the costs, that came from the city manager in december or so. i think matt williams can better speak to that.
“We can go back to horses.”
We can be like the Amish. We will simply replace the bikes towing the Burleys with a horse or better yet mules. God knows Davis is full of them.
David you say the leaders should ask for what they need. That is exactly what they are doing over the next two elections. Instead of always trying to reinvent what our elected officials are doing why not get on board to help them raise the money we all know is needed? You always act as if they do something different than you would its a failure. The had good reasons for doing what they did. It keeps us from having the highest sales tax in the region. They reached consensus on how to proceed with a 5-0 vote. Everyone knows a second vote is coming on a dedicated fund for the roads. There isn’t a lack of transparency. You really need to off your my way or the highway attitude.
Good post Toad, I don’t say thaty too often to you. Davd, from all the posts so far it looks like the consensus is that you are wrong. Just admit you woke up a little too early this morning and your head was a little fuzzy when you wrote this column.
Can’t really use that excuse today, I’ve been working on this for about ten days and it is my view.
A coalition that includes Frankly, Mr. Toad, growth issue and myself — I think that’s a pretty broad spectrum of the political landscape.
They reached a consensus at an hour when no one could think through the consequences of their actions. I’m sorry, I just don’t that this is a good move.
I know we love wallowing around in our own local problems, but if you take the 30,000′ view you will understand why ‘all of the sudden’ there is no money for schools, pensions, street repairs or any other public sector investment: http://bit.ly/1enI8CR
Until there is a broad public clamor to restore progressive tax policy or better yet, control of an out of control oligarchy, paying more taxes is the only answer. Someone has to pay.
Dave – with all due respect, please flee to Europe .
And I suppose you also have no problem with the fact that Davis generates about 35% of the sales tax revenue as does comparable cities. Yes, let’s just ignore that inconvenient fact and make the false claim that we have oligarchs. You are an expert in creative writing though… I will give you that.
Mr. Toad wrote:
> We can be like the Amish. We will simply replace the bikes towing the Burleys
We can try and raise money by getting tourists from red states to come to Davis and stare at the strange way we dress, get around and carry our groceries home from the farmers market (I was thinking something like this)
http://www.padutchcountry.com/members/amish_country_tours.asp
To put the Davis “lifestyle” on the map we could do a remake of the movie “Witness” where a right wing republican cop (played by Harrison Ford) comes to town to protect a small boy who is witness to a murder while in West Sacramento with a blogger (played by David Greenwald) covering police abuse. A romantic side plot will develop when the conservative cop learns about Davis from an attactrive liberal doctor (played by Tia Will) who agrees to hide the boy in her home…
SOD, do you know about the Carneros Inn? That luxury resort hotel was built in a field. Granted it is in the Napa wine are and has slightly cooler summers, but when they announced it there are a lot of people that said it was stupid.
Could Davis attract tourists? I think we could if we were truly progressive, creative and had more of an open mind for development. So, I doubt we could.
This may or may not be conclusive evidence but from conversations I had with people at the Farmer’s Market this weekend it seems like a lot of people may actually already be visiting Davis from out of town. I’m not saying that this is true, but it might be a possibility.
We see people from out of town all the time. My biggest sale this weekend was to a couple that drove over from Fairfield because they found my website. UCD hosts meetings and seminars constantly, and the people wander into the downtown. I’m sure we could do better at capturing those dollars, but it’s happening.
By the way, I don’t want to single anyone out or offend anyone, but the internet presence of many of our downtown businesses is sorely lacking. Perhaps our local business associations could focus on helping small retailers improve their online marketing. It would benefit everyone.
I think this is a good idea. Just brainstorming, but maybe business could provide links to their websites from the Farmer’s Market website.
During the hour and half I spent talking with people at the market this Saturday, I would say more of them were not from Davis then were. I talked to people visiting from Hawaii, LA, quite a from the bay area, the foothills, and even more from surrounding communities, Dixon, Woodland, Fairfield, West Sac. etc. (note my lead question was do you vote in Davis).
Some were visiting family, but a significant number came just for the market. A good question to ask is our they coming just for the marker or are they spending time and money in the community at large?
Thinking that the UCD World Food Center and the regional Farm to Fork initiative might provide Davis some inspiration to develop some new attractions to the city to capture some of that sales tax revenue.
Frankly wrote:
> SOD, do you know about the Carneros Inn?
> That luxury resort hotel was built in a field.
> Granted it is in the Napa wine are and has slightly
> cooler summers, but when they announced it there
> are a lot of people that said it was stupid.
I’ll admit that I though putting a bunch of “double wide” trailers in an ugly open field in Carneros (miles from Napa, Oakville and St. Helena) AND trying to get people to pay ~$400/night was crazy. From what I hear the place is doing great and when we tried to stop by for breakfast on a weekend Napa trip last year we could not find a place to park and ended up leaving when my wife was told it would be a 2 hour wait for a table (to buy an overpriced breakfast featuring overpriced mini donuts)…
> Could Davis attract tourists? I think we could if we were truly
> progressive, creative and had more of an open mind for development.
I think Frankly might be on to something BIG (and someone should e-mail Rob White). Davis could bring in a lot of money from “wine tourists” if we can find a way to work with UCD to show people interested in wine some kind of “behind the scenes” tour of the UCD enology and viticulture department (and then get then in to the city to spend money).
I am amazed how many people interested in wine around the US and even when visiting wine stores and wineries around the world know about Davis and are excited to find out where I am from and want to learn more about the school that turns out so many top winemakers (and top quality root stock)…
I’m with you SOD. I keep thinking that Davis is sitting still on a small goldmine of opportunity. I don’t have the capital and land in the bank to be a big leader on this front. But if I did, I would seriously get down to business making a go out of it.
Wine
Beer
Food
Entertainment
Quirky downtown
Students
High-educated
Surrounded by amber waves of grain.
Interesting… I have good friends that live in Bismark. They actually used to live in Davis, but it was so long ago that when they come back they say it is like going to a foreign country (I feel the same when I visit them). My friends are hunters. In the back yard of my West Davis home they could not believe all the geese flying overhead. They were mesmerized. I have often thought that some well designed water foul viewing resort with high end amenities would be a really cool and different venue. Something east of Davis around the causeway.
Birdwatching is big in this area. Definitely a tourist draw. Probably best closer to the Vic Fazio Yolo Wildlife Area, right on Chiles Road. Inside the city limits.