Goleta Will Vote on Sales Tax and Flavored Tobacco Ban

Goleta voters will decide “yea” or “nay” on two city measures on November 8: Measure B, which adds a penny-on-the-dollar to the sales tax; and Measure C, which bans flavored tobacco and vape cartridges from being sold within city borders. Ballots are already out in voters’ hands and being collected at the Elections offices, but here’s a look at the two measures for those who have yet to cast their ballot.

Measure B

In an impartial analysis of Goleta’s Measure B, the city’s attorney identifies that 0.7 percent of the current 7.75 percent sales tax actually goes to the city. The lion’s share — 7.25 percent — goes to the State of California as its base sales tax rate, a fraction of which is returned to the city and the County of Santa Barbara. Another half a percent is the county’s “lane and train” Measure A transportation tax.

Goleta has the lowest sales tax of any city on the South Coast. Measure B would raise that sales tax to 8.75 percent in 2024, and the one percent increase would stay entirely with the city and not be shared with either the state or the county. The latter is important to city officials, who have fought with the county for years over a mandatory sales and property tax split. Part of the city’s incorporation vote in 2002 required that some of the taxes the county was accustomed to getting from the area would still flow to the county. The resulting Revenue Neutrality Agreement promised to the county half of all Goleta property tax and 30 percent of sales tax received. In addition to the approximately $7 million in lost revenue, what rubs everyone in Goleta City Hall the wrong way is the fact that the deal was made to last in perpetuity.