{"id":802266,"date":"2026-05-17T06:15:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T06:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/802266\/"},"modified":"2026-05-17T06:15:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T06:15:14","slug":"tempe-council-approves-ballot-measure-to-raise-sales-tax-by-0-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/802266\/","title":{"rendered":"Tempe Council approves ballot measure to raise sales tax by 0.5%"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text text-start\"><b>TEMPE, AZ (AZFamily)<\/b> \u2014 The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tempe.gov\/government\/mayor-and-city-council\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.tempe.gov\/government\/mayor-and-city-council\">Tempe City Council<\/a> has approved a measure that will go before voters in November, asking residents to decide on a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tempe.gov\/government\/city-clerk-s-office\/election-information\/november-2026-sales-tax-election\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.tempe.gov\/government\/city-clerk-s-office\/election-information\/november-2026-sales-tax-election\">0.5% sales tax increase<\/a> to help close a $24 million budget deficit.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">City leaders advanced the proposal Thursday, but it drew immediate pushback from some residents, including Mario Martinez. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cTempe taxpayers do not deserve a massive tax increase worth billions,\u201d Martinez said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Councilmember Arlene Chin said the council inherited the shortfall, which she attributed to actions by the Arizona Legislature and the federal government.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">If approved, the 0.5% increase would be split into three categories:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"list | article-list\">\n<li>0.3% for public safety, including police, fire and crime prevention<\/li>\n<li>0.1% for public transit<\/li>\n<li>0.1% for early childhood care and preschool education<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Sgt. Rob Ferraro, president of the <a href=\"https:\/\/aztoa.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/aztoa.org\/\">Tempe Officers Association<\/a>, said the department has fewer officers than it did in 2008, and response times have suffered. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cThis is about giving voters the opportunity to decide if we should finally right-size our public safety system,\u201d Ferraro said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Some residents have raised concerns about whether public safety funding could support the city\u2019s use of Flock cameras, which read license plates and have sparked privacy backlash. The city has defended the cameras as a crime-fighting tool.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Child care costs also surfaced as a major issue. Kirsten Paulet, with the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/phoenix_chamberofmothers\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/phoenix_chamberofmothers\/\">Phoenix-Gilbert chapter of Chamber of Mothers<\/a>, said she pays about $1,000 a month for child care for just two days a week. She said added support could help families avoid long-term financial strain.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIt\u2019s taking from his future, whether that be him purchasing a home, whether him going to college,\u201d Paulet said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Tempe would implement the tax on Jan. 1, 2027, if voters approve it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The city of Tempe has been contacted for comment, but has not yet responded.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text text-start\">See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? <a href=\"https:\/\/www.azfamily.com\/page\/send-us-your-feedback\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Please click here to report it<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text text-start\">Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send <a href=\"https:\/\/www.azfamily.com\/community\/user-content\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">it to us here<\/a> with a brief description.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 KTVK\/KPHO. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TEMPE, AZ (AZFamily) \u2014 The Tempe City Council has approved a measure that will go before voters in&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":802267,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5131],"tags":[326629,5229,5643,1587,7182,81286,326628,1589,7183,183125,326630,326627,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-802266","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix","8":"tag-24-million-budget-deficit","9":"tag-america","10":"tag-arizona","11":"tag-az","12":"tag-azfamily","13":"tag-ballot-measure","14":"tag-increased-tax-ballot-measure","15":"tag-phoenix","16":"tag-phoenix-news","17":"tag-tempe-city-council","18":"tag-tempe-officers-association","19":"tag-tempe-sales-tax","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-united-states-of-america","22":"tag-unitedstates","23":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","24":"tag-us","25":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116588454094384158","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/802266","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=802266"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/802266\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/802267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=802266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=802266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=802266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}