Santa Clara County supes voted last Thursday to ask voters to approve a sales tax hike. If a majority approves, half the county—specifically San Jose, Milpitas and Campbell—will pay double digit sales taxes, while the rest ring up in the high 9s. Vicente Vera was there to report.
The money is needed, county officials say, to protect county residents from catastrophic federal Medicare and Medicaid cuts that will nick the $13.7 billion county budget by more than $1 billion. The tax increase will recover about a third of that.
After buying four hospitals in the past six years, the county has basically become a health care system with smaller side hustles, like courts and sheriffs. Half the county budget goes to health services, more than all its other business units, combined.
The expansion decision, which doubled the public agency’s share of local hospital beds from around 20% to 40%, obviously didn’t anticipate Trump.
County supervisors called the 2pm special meeting the day before and didn’t advise most media until after the 5pm close of business.
Getting public buy-in will be important. Sales taxes disproportionately impact lower income residents, who may not want to pay a 10% tax on daily essentials to fund a system that in 2023 paid 15 doctors more than $1 million a year, and another 14 north of $900k.
