To avoid spending $10.5 million in taxpayer money just to make a political point, Los Angeles County Supervisor Don Knabe announced Thursday that he would change his vote from "no" to "yes" and permit a half-cent sales tax increase for roads and mass transit to be placed on the November ballot with other general election issues.
Knabe, however, made it clear that he would continue to fight the tax proposal.
"I remain absolutely opposed to the MTA sales tax measure and I plan to spend my time and effort campaigning against it," Knabe said in a statement. "The plan is not equitable for all county residents and this is the wrong time to burden people with even higher taxes."
The reversal Thursday was the latest twist in an effort by local transportation officials to put a sales tax proposal before voters in November.
A state bill that is also required to allow the initiative to go to voters is bottled up in the Senate as officials fight over which mass transit projects would receive a share of the projected revenue of $30 billion to $40 billion.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority board last month approved putting the sales tax measure on the ballot. All five supervisors are on that board, but only two -- Yvonne B. Burke and Zev Yaroslavsky -- voted to go forward.
The issue landed before the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday. In a vote that was supposed to be procedural -- basically whether to approve a ballot with a sales tax increase on it -- the five supervisors could not muster a simple majority to do so.
The sales tax could still go to voters, officials said, but it would be on a second ballot that would have to be counted separately from the one used in the general election.
On Tuesday, county Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan had estimated that a separate ballot would cost $2 million to $3 million more.
But by Thursday, that estimate had ballooned to $10.5 million and Knabe decided to switch course. The supervisors are scheduled to meet Tuesday and Knabe's reversal will probably swing the majority in favor of putting the issue on the regular ballot.
Yaroslavsky praised Knabe. "It's a statesmanlike decision," he said.
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa also applauded Knabe's announcement.
"The supervisor is doing the right thing," Villaraigosa said in a statement. "Playing games with the election process would have cost the taxpayers millions and disenfranchised thousands of voters."
