About Snohomish County Public Safety Prop 1
We have all seen the horrors of fentanyl. It is cheap, available all across our region, incredibly addictive, and killing far too many of our residents. Even babies and small children have been killed by fentanyl. And there are other drugs like tranq, a horse tranquilizer, that may become a new major problem.
High rates of drug use and crime have affected neighbors, businesses, and communities across the county. Crime rates are too high. Overdose deaths are too high. Prop 1 will allow Snohomish County to reinforce the criminal justice infrastructure and while forging new tools to fight the drug crisis.
This proposal meets essential public safety needs and ensures Snohomish County residents are healthy and secure. The tax would be .02%, equal to 2 cents on every ten dually purchase. If the challenges weren’t so serious, we would not have proposed this additional sales tax.
Currently, Snohomish County spends more than 75% of our General Fund budget on law and justice agencies, including the Sheriff’s Office, including the jail, Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, Public Defense, the Medical Examiner’s Office, the Department of Emergency Management, and the District and Superior Court System. The other approximately 25% is spent on core county functions, including elections, animal control, the Assessor’s and Treasurer’s Offices, Planning and Development Services, and many more.
If we want to do anything new to address the drug crisis, such as building a secure withdrawal management facility or launching a more robust derelict vehicle program, we have two choices: cut from currently funded programs or ask the public for a new tax. Since over 75% of our General Fund budget goes to law and justice agencies, mostly for personnel, it doesn’t make sense to cut from the very agencies that we need to keep our communities safe. Nor can we cut funding for our core responsibilities, because we have already cut them as much as we can without catastrophic consequences. No one likes taxes but sometimes they are necessary to keep our communities safe.