BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Palo Alto City Council tonight (June 8) placed a half-cent sales tax on the Nov. 3 ballot to buy land and renovate buildings at the dilapidated Cubberley Community Center.
“We’re putting all of our trust in our residents,” Mayor Vicki Veenker said.
The ballot measure was supported by nonprofit leaders and neighbors.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” said former Olympian Anne Cribbs, representing a nonprofit trying to build a gym at Cubberley.
Only resident Chris Brosnan said he’s against the project because it’s a sales tax, not a corporate tax.
“I just don’t understand why people need to subsidize other people’s exercise programs,” he said.
The tax would raise $13 to $15 million per year for the city. The ballot measure focuses on basics like fixing electrical wiring and plumbing because that’s what voters support in polls, Assistant Director of Administrative Services Christine Paras told council.
The measure doesn’t mention that the city would use the money to buy seven acres at Cubberley from the Palo Alto Unified School District for $65.5 million. The school district’s $800 per parcel tax failed at ballot box last week, not getting the 66.7% needed to pass.
The half-cent measure will depend on the state Legislature passing a bill by August to raise Palo Alto’s sales tax cap above 10%. If a bill doesn’t pass, then the city would pursue a quarter-cent measure, or 0.25%, to stay at 10%.
Members of a ballroom dancing group who have used a pavilion at Cubberley for 35 years have expressed apprehension about moving as a result of the revamp.
The old high school is home to nonprofits, artists and youth programs.
Councilman Keith Reckdahl said the city will accommodate existing tenants, and they don’t need to be nervous that “the new kids on the block will replace them.”
Former school board member Jennifer DiBrienza said she will lead a “full-throttle campaign in the fall” to support the measure.
“We really have a whole sort of spiderweb of support,” DiBrienza said tonight.
DiBrienza was on the school board from 2016 to 2024 and chaired a committee with Councilwoman Julie Lythcott-Haims that negotiated a land deal between the district and the city.
Now that the measure is officially on the ballot, council members can no longer advocate for the tax.
“I’m feeling emotional right now because we’re about to hand this off to the public. Just wow, look how far we’ve come,” Lythcott-Haims said.
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