A proposal to raise the gross-receipts tax in Las Cruces to help fund “quality-of-life” initiatives such as operation and maintenance of city ball fields, creation of new bike paths and the expansion of artistic and cultural programs has been delayed, but supporters of the tax say it isn’t dead.
The Las Cruces Sun-News has the scoop on organizers of the petition drive suspending their efforts until the fall. Their explanation: It’s summer, and lots of people are out of town.
“Here we are with about three weeks left to turn in the petition and we probably would’ve had only needed maybe 300 more signatures,” Las Cruces resident Alice Cox was quoted by the newspaper as saying. “We would have easily made that, but we wanted many more than that. The consensus to pull the petition now was based on the fact that we could get more help and more support in September or October than we have now.”
Another supporter of the petition drive and tax increase, Isaac Chavez, was quoted by the Sun-News as saying that “a lot of the community shuts down in the summertime.”
“People go on vacation and organizations become less active than all other times of the year,” he said. “Our goal has been to get as many people, as many organizations as possible, involved in this campaign. But there’s so many stakeholders that are not around right now and we thought that would ultimately hurt.”
Chavez was quoted as saying that response to the proposal was positive. Organizers want to raise the GRT by 1/4 of 1 percent, which would generate millions of dollars annually.
Chavez and Cox said the petition drive will restart in the fall.
The organizers need to submit the signatures of at least 2,136 voters in the city limits for the council to consider the petition. According to the Sun-News, the city council could then approve the tax on its own or call for a referendum election.
I’ve already expressed my opposition to this proposed tax-increase.