After years of lobbying, the Ventura County Fire Department today is expected to get approval for an annual share of sales tax dollars its leaders say are needed to make up for state budget cuts.
A majority of the Board of Supervisors said Monday that they would vote in favor of giving Fire Chief Bob Roper a cut of the estimated $58 million raised each year by a special half-cent sales tax increase approved by voters in 1993.
The money was intended to make up for property tax revenue shifted away from local public safety agencies by the state.
But in the last decade, the Fire Department has received less than $1 million, county budget officials said.
Meanwhile, the Sheriff's Department, the district attorney's office and two other public safety departments have reaped hundreds of millions of dollars in additional revenue.
Although the share that the Fire Department would receive would be relatively small, about $1.8 million a year, it would right an inequality voters have questioned since they approved Proposition 172, said board Chairwoman Kathy Long.
"There's been a void in the public's mind as to why [the Fire Department] never seemed to get a piece of the 172 funds," Long said. "It left people with the feeling that it wasn't fair. From here forward, there won't be any question that they are part of the 172 formulas."
Three other supervisors -- John Flynn, Linda Parks and Steve Bennett -- said they would vote in favor of the new formula. Supervisor Judy Mikels could not be reached for comment.
Ventura County supervisors, in settling the dispute, may have an eye on a much nastier fight over a similar issue in Orange County.
A firefighters union in that county placed a measure on next week's ballot to set aside a small portion of Proposition 172 payments for the Orange County Fire Authority.
County supervisors responded by putting three counterproposals on the ballot that would undercut or eliminate any share sought by firefighters.
Statewide, many other fire agencies left out of the Proposition 172 sales tax increase are waiting to see the outcome of Tuesday's election, said Roper, Ventura County's fire chief.
"With the Ventura County board's action, it avoids the voter issues and leaves this funding in the hands of the Board of Supervisors," he said.
In the past, supervisors have said the fire agency didn't need the sales tax money because it was adequately funded by property tax dollars.
