Recently, NAIOP Silicon Valley reported that the City of Sunnyvale was considering a tax. Below, NAIOPSV provides a play-by-play of council action, and what to expect next.

The First Vote.

The City of Sunnyvale Councilmembers voted 3-3 to place the measure on the ballot with Vice Mayor Cisneros absent.

The motion failed and thereby the City Council had two choices:

1) The Mayor along with the City Manager could have place the item on the following City Council meeting of August 9th.  This would make it close to impossible to draft the ballot language, rebuttals and responses to rebuttals on time.

2) The Mayor and the City Manager could have a special meeting to discuss the item and take a vote on it until there is a 4-3 vote (pass/fail).

The motions were as follows:

Councilmember Din made a motion to add the Real Estate Transfer Tax item to the Nov. 8, 2022 Ballot, with the following modifications:

  • Remove from the Ballot Question: “essential” and “addressing homelessness.”
  • Add language addressing the existing Property Transfer Tax.
  • Reduce the time frame for adjusting the Exemption Threshold from five years to two years.

The motion failed with Mayor Klein and Councilmembers Larsson and Din voting yes, Councilmembers Hendricks, Melton and Spitaleri voting no, and Vice Mayor Cisneros absent.

Councilmember Melton made a motion to not place the Real Estate Transfer Tax item on the Nov. 8, 2022 Ballot.

The motion failed with Councilmembers Hendricks, Melton and Spitaleri voting yes, Mayor Klein and Councilmembers Larsson and Din voting no, and Vice Mayor Cisneros absent.

What happens next.

Since neither side was able to get 4 council members to vote for or against it, the Mayor needed to agendize the item to be voted on by August 12th deadline. Since they were unable to reach a majority due to an absent, the transfer tax increase was not able to move forward.

NAIOP will continue working with the City of Sunnyvale to ensure that we have a seat on the table when they explore the tax increase in 2024.

—

About NAIOP Silicon Valley:

Edesa Bitbadal, Chief Public Policy Strategist for NAIOPSV, prepares the Public Policy Update, like the one above, for our members and partners.  To learn more about the various taxes and public policy perspective, please contact Edesa Bitbadal.