Going to the polls

County, city hire polling firm to gauge opinion on airport tax increase

by Tracy Chamberlin

How do city and county officials ask tax payers for more money?
With the parks and rec half-cent sales tax renewal a not-so-distant memory, and La Plata County looking to fund maintenance for roads and bridges in the near future, city and county officials are left wondering how to talk to voters about paying for yet another project.
In an effort to figure out when would be the right time to bring up the airport, they’re turning to the professionals.
Although polls are often used like props for talking heads during election season, it’s the ones the political pundits don’t use that can often help municipalities and businesses gauge a community’s need and willingness to pay for a particular project.
Like the need for a new airport in La Plata County, and resident’s enthusiasm for footing the bill.

The city and county have hired Keith Frederick, owner of Virginia-based FrederickPolls, to help them find the answer.
His firm deals with about four to six ballot issues each year, ranging from health care and energy measures to transportation and politics.
Frederick, who has more than 35 years experience in the industry, said during a meeting Tuesday afternoon that he is excited to be a part of the process. County commissioners, city councilors and representatives of the Durango-La Plata Airport met with Frederick to hammer out the details of the survey.

Polling phone calls are tentatively scheduled to start May 7 and continue through the week. Questions will range from demographic information, like age and gender, to specifics about sales and property tax increases.
An initiative to raise taxes could show up on the November ballot this year or in 2016, depending on the outcome of the poll.
Elections falling on odd-numbered years tend to have less turnout. For La Plata County, about 30,000 residents showed up to vote during the last presidential election, and half of that turned out in off-year elections.
If there’s a significant difference in the outcome between a 2015 ballot initiative and a 2016 one, Frederick thinks the polling will show that.
“No election happens in a vacuum,” he added.
The political climate of a community, as well as other initiatives on the ballot, can impact the result.
It’s one reason the city and county have turned to Frederick. The pollster plans to ask residents about their awareness of the issue, their overall mood on taxes, politics and a host of other information. The goal is to get honest, accurate answers from a representative sampling of the community.

Of course, the only way to get that sample is to get people on the phone.
County Commissioner Julie Westendorff and City Councilor Christina Rinderle admitted they don’t tend to answer phone surveys.
They’re not alone. According the Frederick, his polling firm calls about 30 households to get one response. In order to get the 300 to 400 responses they’re looking for, they just might call everyone in the county.
The real challenge, Frederick said, is the 18-39 age group. In order to get an honest sampling of the community, they need to speak to all ages. This age group is less likely than any other to pick up the phone and spend 10-12 minutes answering questions.
Frederick deals with the challenge by setting a quota of how many responses in that specific demographic are required to complete the poll.
He said turning to email to reach them isn’t an option because the pollster can’t control who responds. It could be one person in one household responding from a handful of email accounts.
With phone surveys and person-to-person responses, they know it’s one survey and one household. This gives them the accurate reading they’re looking for.

When county and city officials first began looking for a way to improve the current airport’s shortfalls, they hired Jviation, a planning, design and construction firm headquartered in Denver and specializing in aviation projects.
Using industry calculations for serving the approximately 400,000 passengers who traveled through the terminal last year, Jviation found the current 41,500-square-foot space needs to be twice as big.
In order to bring the airport up to snuff, they came up with several options including remodeling the current terminal and building a new one.
Back in March, the City Council and county commissioners threw their support behind building a new airport terminal on the opposite, or east, side of the runway from where it sits now.

Back in March, the City Council and county commissioners threw their support behind building a new airport terminal on the opposite, or east, side of the runway from where it sits now. This choice comes with three separate phases of construction. The first meets the needs for today, which means doubling the square footage, with a new 82,000-square-foot terminal and 1,500 parking spaces./File photoThe second and third phases continue to expand the terminal, taxiway and other facilities to meet the airport’s needs into the future.
The money the county and city are seeking with the possible tax increase would cover the costs for the first phase of construction. The expansions in the second and third phase would be covered by federal grants and airport revenues, according to Director of Aviation Kip Turner.
The price tag for the first phase of the project is estimated at $80 to $85 million. The Federal Aviation Administration, or FAA, has agreed to match local funds up to $40 million, which would cover half. In order to get those monies, however, local municipalities must show they’ve secured the other half.

One way to secure the funds is an increase in sales or property taxes, and both those options are part of the polling questions.
If elected officials pursued a 20-year bond for the $40 million, the sales tax would go up an additional .32 percent.
For the city, it raises the current 7.9 percent tax rate to 8.22 percent. In the county, that number jumps from 2 percent to 2.32 percent. For both, it comes out to an increase of one-third of a penny for every dollar spent.
When it comes to property taxes, the mill levy, or tax rate, is the number in question.
Property tax equations use the assessed value of a property and the mill levy to calculate the tax. A higher mill levy means a higher tax.
Under the current rate, the owner of a residential property worth $350,000 in La Plata County pays about $236 in taxes each year. If voters approved a higher mill levy to cover the $40 million bond, their tax would go up an additional $44 each year.
The county recently held public meetings on the airport. Westendorff said one thing they heard from residents was that they don’t want the airport to be built on the backs of homeowners.

It’s one reason some support a sales tax increase over a property tax increase.
This prompted city and county officials to comment that the taxes for commercial and industry property owners are significantly higher than residential ones.
The assessed value of a residential property, the key component to calculating the property taxes, is 7.96 percent. For commercial and industry property, the assessed value is about 28 percent. It means that $44 paid per year by a residential owner would be an extra $466 for commercial and industry property owners.

Once the polling is complete, the results, as well as additional funding options, will likely be discussed at another joint study session scheduled at 4 p.m., Tues., June 9 at City Hall. Then city and county can get a better idea about when and how to bring this request to the voters. After all, timing is everything.