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Eric Wier evoked the name of late fire chief, Steve Wakefield, when outlining what he says Crescent City could lose if residents repealed Measure S, the 1 percent sales tax voters approved two years ago.

Crescent City Fire & Rescue volunteers would respond to an increasing number of calls with aging equipment and fewer vehicles, the city manager said Monday. Plans to transform the department into a hybrid agency consisting of paid captains and volunteers would be scrapped.

Losing the $2 million Measure S generated annually would also result in fewer police officers, streets going unmaintained and a swimming pool with reduced operating hours, Wier told the City Council. They would have to decide what gets funded and what gets cut, he continued.

“In general, it represents right now 20 percent of the general fund to fund those core services,” Wier said of Measure S. “None of these things we talked about would have funding unless the Council decided there was another general fund expense to be reduced.”

Before Wier launched into his report about Measure S and the potential impacts of a successful repeal, Councilors unanimously approved the ballot question voters will consider in the November election.

The question is as follows: “Shall the measure to eliminate the 1 percent sales tax approved by city voters in 2020 (Measure S), which applies within the City of Crescent City, thereby reducing funding available for general city services such as street maintenance/repair, the volunteer fire department, the Crescent City Police Department, the community pool, and other services, be adopted?”

Crescent City resident Jeff McCaddon authored the petition to repeal Measure S, which garnered the 49 signatures required to place the initiative on the ballot.

According to former Crescent City Councilor, Donna Westfall, secretary of the Crescent City-Del Norte County Taxpayers’ Association, proponents of the repeal submitted arguments to the Del Norte County Elections Office this week.

In his arguments, according to Westfall, McCaddon takes issue with the chairwoman of the Measure S Oversight Committee, Kelly Schellong.

“The chairwoman of the Measure S Oversight Committee is the same person who didn’t sk one question while sitting on the City Council in 2007 as to why the sewer plant fiasco went from $19.2 mil (sic) in costs to $43.8 mil in the span of a couple months,” Westfall told the Wild Rivers Outpost in an email Thursday.

“‘Essentially the city has hired a prior uncompromising rubber-stamp, big-spending Councilperson to Chair “Oversight” on their unrestrained spending spree of Measure S funds,’” Westfall said, quoting McCaddon’s statement of accuracy.

The Taxpayers’ Association is behind a proposed repeal of Measure R, the county’s 1 percent sales tax measure that voters approved in 2020. Its members also attempted a repeal against Crescent Fire Protection District’s 2021 benefit assessment, but failed to get enough signatures to place it on the 2022 ballot.

In 2020, 64.57 percent of Crescent City voters approved Measure S. The measure brought Crescent City’s sales tax rate from 7.5 percent to 8.5 percent, Wier said Monday. In 2022, the city’s sales tax rate decreased to 8.25 percent when Measure F, a 2014 sales tax benefitting the Del Norte County Fairgrounds, expired.

Wier compared Crescent City’s sales tax rate with other North Coast communities including Eureka, Arcata, Trinidad and Fortuna, which have an 8.5 percent rate, and Rio Dell with an 8.75 percent sales tax rate.

Wier also praised the Oversight Committee, saying they’re engaged with what the city’s needs are and want to see results. The expenditures that tax revenue were used for came from the Oversight Committee’s recommendations.

Of the roughly $2 million the Measure S sales tax generated, $740,318 was allocated to the Crescent City Police Department. Chief Richard Griffin used $180,145 to hire two cadets currently making their way through the academy and plans to add a third officer. Nearly $20,000 will go toward a detective position.

Earlier in Monday’s meeting, Griffin introduced Sgt. Kostya, CCPD’s new K9 officer. Though the department’s new four-legged recruit comes to them courtesy of a donation and a grant, about $9,200 in Measure S dollars will be used to continue incorporating new K9s into the department, according to Wier.

Measure S also paid for new body cameras and Tasers, are earmarked for vehicle dash cameras and will go toward new firearms and personal protective equipment, Wier said. A total of $110,000 will be allocated for the design of a new police department building, while $235,000 will upgrade CCPD’s vehicle fleet, he said.

About $1.5 million in Measure S dollars is going toward street improvements, including extending the reconstruction of Front Street from H to I streets, repairing potholes, sidewalks and street lights and to maintain the community’s “collector streets,” Wier said.

The Front Street reconstruction project is also being performed using general fund, American Rescue Plan Act and Local Transportation Commission dollars, according to Wier.

“Materials are arriving and are stacked on C Street,” he told Councilors on Monday. “Unfortunately not all the parts will be there and you. Need all the parts before you can do an underground project. The project will be bid this winter and be under construction this spring.”

For the Fred Endert Municipal Pool, Measure S allocates $380,000 towards its operational budget. According to Wier, the pool’s 2022-23 budget included a deficit of about $650,000, primarily due to minimum wage increases.

According to Wier, much of the $380,000 is being used for mentorship of the pool’s lifeguards, which are primarily teenagers. Another $350,000 is being allocated to replace equipment.

The Measure S Oversight Committee also approved the allocation of $516,233 to replace the pool’s HVAC system, and $130,000 to replace the locker room floor, according to Wier.

When speaking of Crescent City Fire & Rescue, Wier brought up a masterplan Councilors and the Crescent Fire Protection District Board approved in 2019. That plan called for hiring three paid captains to create a hybrid agency along with replacing outdated fire apparatus and equipment.

Wier noted that it was that fire masterplan that prompted the creation of Measure S. At the time, 20 active volunteers were responding to an average 1,300 calls for service annually, serving 19,500 people throughout 28.4 square miles.

Wier said it was Wakefield, who was forced to retire after having a series of strokes in 2018 and died in April 2019, who called for many of the changes outlined in that masterplan.

The paid captains would relieve the work load for many of the fire department’s battalion chiefs as well as its fire chief, Kevin Carey, who works two 24-hour shifts and two 12-hour shifts weekly, Wier said. Volunteers would staff the rest of the department, he said.

“To implement it, the fire department master plan says we need about $307,000 annually above what we were expending previously on the department,” Wier told Councilors. “The hiring of three captains, we’re currently working on that. The estimated hire date is in January. We’re finalizing job descriptions and hope to put that out to recruitment some time in October.”

During their discussion, Councilor Beau Smith, who is also a volunteer firefighter, also mentioned Wakefield.

“He was my fire chief,” Smith said, “and I don’t want to see something like that happen to Chief Carey. We won’t let it happen. We can’t.”

Blake Inscore, who is on the ballot to serve two more years on the City Council, said Measure S is being used for exactly what he and his colleagues promised it would be used for.

“This is not about frills. This is about providing excellent service to the people of Crescent City,” he said. “I would just implore the people of Crescent City to recognize that your city has done exactly what we said we would do.”

Mayor Jason Greenough agreed with Inscore and Wier when they said that Measure S is funding core city services. If the tax measure is repealed, he said he and his colleagues will have to cut services to “make the budget responsible.”

“I’m not looking forward to those meetings, but it’ll have to happen to be fiscally responsible,” he said. “I implore the people of Crescent City, I hope they do their homework and look at the information that has been provided and do their research and make an informed decision on Election Day. This will affect our community in a negative way if it is repealed.”

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