While Measure Z clearly removes a tax, the issue is indeed far from simple. But first, the easier part to understand: Currently residents and businesses alike subsidize the employee portion of our public employee pensions though an assessment included as a part of our property tax bill. This means the city pays their agreed-upon contribution and the employee pays their agreed-upon contribution minus that which we supply through our property tax bill.
There are several issues at work here. The first is that our property taxes should not be going toward anybody's pensions. That's not what they are meant for, and that can be rectified through passage of Measure Z. The second issue is that what the city contributes versus what the employee contributes is no longer fair or sustainable. I know we have legally binding contracts, but we also have cities going broke and people losing jobs because of those contracts and the economy they now exist in. Third, not only is the distribution unfair, we compound the unfairness by further reducing the employee contribution by our subsidy through our property tax assessment.
