The Tulsa City Council delayed action last week on setting an election on a proposed $700 million street bond plan after the city’s legal, finance, and public works departments asked for more time to review the proposal.
The council is now looking at an Aug. 26 election, rather than one in late July, for voters to decide on the plan to dedicate a combination of existing taxes to support $636 million of sales tax revenue bonds. The proposal would also include $62 million of general obligation bonds.
Councilor Bill Christiansen said he would not support a streets package that does not include a significant street widening effort. He suggested an equal split between street widening and maintenance, and a shorter time period than the 12-year program proposed by Councilor Bill Martinson.
Martinson’s proposal calls for supporting the sales tax bonds with an extension until 2020 of a combined 1.76% sales tax that includes the city’s third-penny 1% sales tax that will expire in early 2013, the county’s 0.0167% Four-To-Fix II sales tax that will expire in 2012, and the countywide 0.6% Vision 2025 sales taxes set to expire at the end of 2016.
The GO bonds would be supported by increases in Tulsa’s property tax rate over 10 years from the current 13.5 mills to 16.8 mills.
