The success of Penny for Pasco signals an increase in political clout for folks in the east-west 54 corridor.
By STEPHEN HEGARTY and MATTHEW WAITE
Published March 11, 2004
Penny for Pasco advocates said for months they were not relying on Democrats nor avoiding Republicans in Tuesday's sales tax referendum.
Good thing.
Analysis of Tuesday's vote shows that heavily Democratic precincts were not particularly friendly toward the tax increase. And some predominantly Republican precincts voted for it.
It isn't until you look beyond political affiliation that a different pattern emerges: Voters along the 54 corridor - the high-growth, east-west band across the bottom of the county - consistently voted for the Penny tax.
From Trinity across to Wesley Chapel, with rare exceptions, precincts said yes to the sales tax increase to build schools and fix roads. Some political observers say that corridor, which is filling with young families with school-age kids, finally has emerged as a political force to be reckoned with in Pasco County. It might already be on par with west Pasco's conservative retirees, long a key to countywide electoral success.
"That's really a new phenomenon in Pasco politics," said John Long, who has been involved in Pasco elections for decades. "Pasco politicians are going to have to realize there's a different kind of voter along the 54 corridor."
Reginald and Katrina Pope moved to the Meadow Pointe neighborhood in Wesley Chapel about a year ago. Their 4-year-old son, Dorian, will attend Sand Pine Elementary in August. They both voted for the penny tax increase.
"We have a lot of new schools. We hope the Penny will help out because of overcrowding," said Reginald Pope, 40, who owns an information technology firm and serves as a staff sergeant in the Army Reserve. "We need an increase as long as it goes toward what they're saying it goes for."
For months, the Penny for Pasco campaign was criticized for putting the measure on the March 9 ballot rather than the general election in November. The reasoning was that Democrats would show up in greater numbers because of the presidential primary and that they would support the tax increase. On Wednesday, Citizens Against Penny for Pasco's Bill Bunting said again that "it was definitely the timing. This thing would not have passed in November."
It's true that more Democrats than Republicans turned out Tuesday, despite the GOP's 4,500 countywide lead in voter registration. In fact, of the 74 precincts where more Republicans are registered, in all but five of them more Democrats showed up Tuesday.
But the conventional wisdom fell apart at the polls.
Consider the Fairway Springs neighborhood off SR 54 in west Pasco where registered Republicans outnumber Democrats 492 to 279. That precinct went for the Penny by 58 percent. It was one of only four precincts with more Republicans registered and more Republicans who turned out Tuesday. And in all four the tax increase passed.
On the flip side, out of the 65 precincts where there were more Democrats registered, and more Democrats turned out, only 25 of those precincts approved the tax.
Jennifer Seney, head of the pro-Penny group Preserve Pasco!, said going with the primary election date was critical for the campaign - because voters were able to focus on the issue.
"I believe if we had gone in November, we would have been buried," she said, referring to the numerous other issues and candidates that will crowd the November ballot. "There is no way we would have gotten as much press coverage and newsprint. ... This way, the Penny has been in the newspaper every day since November."
Said Seney, "This is a true reflection of what the people want, because there's nothing else (on the ballot)."
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From the start, the Penny for Pasco campaign was something of an odd duck as political campaigns go. After being rejected by voters in 1995, the school district cast its lot with the county, hoping that a heaping plate of projects would appeal to voters. Interviews with voters Tuesday indicated that the county portion might have been a weak link.
County Administrator John Gallagher acknowledged Wednesday that the school projects drew stronger support from voters.
"The school system - I think they carried us," he said. "Transportation is not real fancy, and it's hard to get people excited about it. The schools are what get people out to vote."
That theory was bolstered by what happened in Hernando County, where a tax increase for schools passed and a separate one for the county failed.
Pasco County Commission Chairman Peter Altman rejected that reasoning. "Those who voted against it simply have a philosophy that enough money has come from their pockets, and we should find another way," Altman said. Nevertheless, Altman expressed gratitude to the school district for getting out the vote.
The school district philosophy all along was focused more on getting parents of school kids out to vote for the tax. It had an army of motivated teachers and parents working, calling fellow parents, distributing signs and canvassing neighborhoods. Many of them had never been involved in a political campaign before.
When he was approached to get involved, Robert Ridle figured he might put a sign in his yard, maybe hand out a few fliers. He characterized his previous political experience as "Nothing. Zero. I mean, I vote. But that was it."
The west Pasco Realtor ended up spending hours hanging fliers on doors. On election day, he found himself standing in the bus loop at an elementary school dressed like a big cardboard penny.
"I guess I got into it a lot more than I expected," said Ridle, who has two children in the public schools.
The approval of the sales tax increase even got a nod from the state's most prominent advocate for lower taxes: Gov. Jeb Bush.
Bush, who has spent his five years in office advocating lower taxes, said Wednesday he saw no problem with voters in Pasco and Hernando approving a tax increase even as he pitches another round of tax cuts at the state level.
The Republican governor drew a distinction between a statewide tax change and one approved locally by voters.
"We should have local options. ... That's the way it should work," Bush said.
- Staff writers Lisa Buie, Rebecca Catalanello, Bridget Hall Grumet and Joni James contributed to this report.
