Wednesday, Jul. 08, 2009
There’s no controlling mosquitoes next year after defeat of ballot measure
The bloodsuckers will fly freely after funding for vector control is nixed by voters and officials
Comments (0) | 
E-Mail
Print
tool name
closeBecause of the recent defeat of a countywide ballot measure, no mosquito control will take place in San Luis Obispo County by the end of the year.
Property owners in the county rejected the assessment by a more than 2-1 margin. In the official tally, the measure was defeated by a 67.41 to 32.59 percent margin.
“Essentially, we are dismantling the existing program so that come Jan. 1 there will be no mosquito abatement services provided by the county,” said Curt Batson, county environmental health director.
In addition to the assessment failing, county supervisors voted June 23 as part of their annual budgeting process to eliminate existing funding for vector control activities. Two mosquito abatement positions will be eliminated.
If the measure had passed, the owner of an average single-family home would have paid $9.80 more in property taxes. This would have generated $1.1 million annually for a comprehensive program to control disease-carrying pests, and staffing for that work would have gone from two to five and a half positions with three seasonal employees.
Most agree that the recession, coupled with governmental belt-tightening on all levels, was the primary reason the assessment failed.
Farmers and ranchers were one influential group that opposed the assessment. They felt that it placed an unfair burden on large-property owners, said Paul Clark, a Shandon rancher and dry-land farmer who is past president of the San Luis Obispo County Farm Bureau.
The fact that the county has not seen a large outbreak of a vector-borne disease such as West Nile virus also played a role.
“West Nile virus was big on the radar screen when this first came out,” Clark said. “Everyone was expecting a much bigger outbreak, and we just didn’t see it.”
There were signs that the assessment was in serious trouble before the 45-day voting period ended June 23. On that day, county supervisors voted to abstain from participating in the election because of public opposition.
That meant that the county’s $5,661 worth of weighted property tax assessments — the equivalent of about 700 single-family dwellings — counted neither for nor against the assessment.
Agencies such as the state and federal governments are large-property owners in the county, but they typically do not participate in assessment elections, Batson said. One local government that did participate was the city of San Luis Obispo.
The City Council voted the city’s $1,760 worth of weighted property values in favor of the assessment. The vote was consistent with the council’s historic support of vector-control activities, said Ken Hampian, city manager.
The Board of Supervisors is expected to make the results of the assessment election official when it meets Tuesday.
Reach David Sneed at 781-7930
What you should know about comments on SanLuisObispo.com
SanLuisObispo.com is happy to provide a forum for reader interaction, discussion, feedback and reaction to our stories. However, we reserve the right to delete inappropriate comments or ban users who can't play nice. See our full terms of service here.
Here are some rules of the road:
- Keep your comments civil. Don't insult one another or the subjects of our articles. If you think a comment violates our guidelines click the "report abuse" button. Responding to the comment will only encourage bad behavior.
- Don't use profanities, vulgarities or hate speech. This is a general interest news site. Sometimes, there are children present. Don't say anything in a way you wouldn't want your own child to hear.
- Do not attack other users; focus your comments on issues, not individuals.
- Stay on topic. Only post comments relevant to the article at hand. If you want to discuss an issue with a specific user, click on his profile name and leave him a public message.
- Do not copy and paste outside material into the comment box.
- Don't repeat the same comment over and over. We heard you the first time.
- Do not use the commenting system for advertising. That's spam and it isn't allowed.
- Don't use all capital letters. That's akin to yelling and not appreciated by the audience.
You should also know that The Tribune does not screen comments before they are posted. You are more likely to see inappropriate comments before our staff does, so we ask that you click the "report abuse" button to submit those comments for moderator review. You also may notify us via email at webmaster@sanluisobispo.com. Note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us the profile name of the user who made the comment. Remember, comment moderation is subjective. You may find some material objectionable that we won't and vice versa.
If you submit a comment, the username of your account will appear along with it. Users cannot remove their own comments once they have submitted them, but you may ask our staff to retract one of your comments by sending an email to webmaster@sanluisobispo.com. Again, make sure you note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us your profile name.
About comments
Reader comments on SanLuisObispo.com are the opinions of the writer, not The Tribune. If you see an objectionable comment, click the "report abuse" button below it. We will delete comments containing inappropriate links, obscenities, hate speech, and personal attacks. Flagrant or repeat violators will be banned. See more about comments here.