SF Voters to Decide on New Real Estate Tax
San Francisco Supervisors have voted to put a tax increase on the November ballot, and at the same time they rejected two other tax proposals to bring in new revenue.
The tax proposal comes from Supervisor John Avalos, who wants voters to raise the real estate transfer tax on all property sales over $5 million as a way to raise about $25 million a year in new revenue. Click to Listen
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"We just recently closed a $483 million budget deficit and this is a brief respite for our financial health, but we don't know what's going to happen," said Avalos.
But Mayor Gavin Newsom says the budget is balanced, and new taxes are just an excuse to spend more taxpayer money.
"It's a solution in search of a problem," said Newsom. "We balanced our budget without increasing taxes because we don't need to."
Although the supervisors approved the real estate transfer tax hike for the November ballot, they tabled proposals to hike the parking tax and enact a new rent tax on commercial property.
