“It was a very cordial meeting,” said Mike Jenkins of Goleta’s first foray on Thursday into discussions with the county about the tax-sharing agreement they agreed to when the city formed in 2002.
At stake is the roughly $7 million Goleta has given to the county on average out of its annual share of property and sales tax. The Revenue Neutrality Agreement was meant to compensate the county for tax losses when Goleta became its own entity, sliced out of formerly county lands, but Jenkins, the city’s attorney, said in an earlier interview that roads were a good way to understand the inequity that has developed since 2002.
As in all city incorporations in California, Goleta took over the care and maintenance of its roads from the county. Residential and hotel growth since 2002 has exploded within the city borders and also near the UC Santa Barbara campus population. The big-box stores in Goleta only became more dominant along the South Coast as smaller retail stores have dwindled. All that added to more traffic on Goleta’s roads, which they were not built to handle, Jenkins said.