Bill Medrano is more attuned than most Pico Rivera residents to a series of sales tax increases that -- starting today -- will push the rate in his blue-collar suburb to nearly 11%, the highest in the state and one of the steepest in the nation.
And he's not happy.
"It's almost as if we're getting punished," the 32-year-old security firm assistant manager complained this week on a trip to one the town's large retail centers. "It all adds up: a penny here, a penny there. . . . It's a big deal because everything is going up."
No California community is facing a more abrupt reckoning with a wave of mid-recession sales tax increases than Medrano's bedroom community southeast of Los Angeles.
To avoid cuts in crime-fighting and other services, city voters last year agreed to impose a 1% local sales tax on top of Los Angeles County's 8.25% rate. A few months later, lawmakers piled on another 1% statewide to bail Sacramento out of its fiscal crisis. Both increases take effect today.
A half-cent boost in the countywide sales tax will kick in July 1, thanks to last fall's voter-approved transportation measure, Measure R.
In all, Pico Rivera sales taxes will have climbed from 8.25% to 10.75% in just three months -- a total tax increase of 30% that is still sinking in for many residents and businesses.
"Unbelievable," said Dale Snowden, a sales manager at a Pico Rivera firm that sells large trucks and repair parts. Already anxious about the taxes beginning today, he groaned when told of the transit tax increase yet to come. "It's a huge financial impact on our customers," he said, predicting some may take their parts purchases to lower-tax communities.
The increases also mean families like Medrano's, looking to buy a new car in the next year, will fork out hundreds of dollars more. Auto sales taxes are based on rates in the town where the owner registers the vehicle.
For Pico Rivera residents, that translates to 20% to 30% more in taxes than for car buyers living in higher-income cities in Orange and Ventura counties, where rates will remain under 9%. Only nearby South Gate, which phased in a local sales tax last fall, will match Pico Rivera. Both cities are on track to surpass Chicago, which now collects a 10.25% sales levy, one of the country's highest. And they'll be closing in on a handful of small Arkansas towns collecting 11%.
