Here are some quick facts about Pima County that may help you understand exactly why we have one of the highest property tax rates in the state:

1. Unincorporated Pima County makes up 36% of the total county population.To compare, Maricopa County has 6% of their population in unincorporated areas. Austin is 18%, Albuquerque is 17%,  Salt Lake 16%, Portland 2%, Seattle 12%.  With such a big population to serve we loose out in state shared revenues and must provide services like police and potholes to a much larger area than comparable counties around the country.

2. An aweful lot of DEBT.The Grand Total of Debt for all the counties in Arizona is $1.15 billion. Pima County’s combined primary and secondary debt load (open space bonds, sewer, transportation etc.) equals $757 million of the $1.15 billion. All other counties combined have the remaining $339 million.  Our debt load is more than double all other the other counties in Arizona COMBINED.

3. How Serious Have Cuts Been? Pima County has cut most departments this year. Most have seen a 10% reduction, EXCEPT:
                County Administration went from $100 to $102 Million
                Community and Economic Development went from $70 to $85 million
                Debt service went from $100 to $110 million

4. Does Pima County have a bonding problem? A breakdown in PAST voter approved bond packages:

      1997 - $362 million in general obligation bonds in May 1997 and
                   $350 million in transportation bonds that November (27 of the 34 projects approved in
                           the 2006 RTA vote where carry overs from the 97′ bonds)
                   $105m sewer ($65m Ina and $4.5 Roger)          
      2004 -  $582m general bonds and ($174m open space - $81m health & community - $183m
                                 courts/safety)
                    $150m sewer ($17m Ina and $25 Roger)
      2006-   $54m (Kino and jail)
      2009? - PROPOSED  - $700 to $900 million
                      $345m open space
                      $565m wastewater

   More on Pima County’s sewer option from Dave Divine - January 29, 2009, The Tucson Weekly:

“How many times have we given them money for Roger Road?” Schuh asks. “I understand we have to have some taxes, but (we seem) to have a group that never seems to get the job done.”

Huckelberry counters, “The money we’ve put into the plant has been for odor control and keeping it operational so it wouldn’t collapse.”

5. Lots of people work at Pima County:
        Pima County is the 8th largest employer in our region with 6235 employees. Pima County has more than DOUBLEthe employees per population served than Maricopa County, Travis County (Austin) Bernalillo County (Albuquerque), Salt Lake County, Multnomah County (Portland) and Clark County (Las Vegas).

6. Kino Hospital-The County is legally mandated to provide a psychiatric hospital. When the County ran Kino as a psych unit, they lost $34m. In a deal to increase services and reduce the County’s cost, Kino management was shifted over to UPH. The deal was to be a total of $125m in total guarantees over a 10 year period. . It looks like at the pace we are going, we are due to hit the $125m in year 5 with no end to the subsidy in site.

7. Open Space priorities.  Pima County voters have approved close to $400m in open space purchases to protect outlining areas. The purchases are part of the goals of the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan. The proposed bond package will include another $345m bringing the total open space commitment to almost 3/4 of a billion dollars. Without discussing the merits of the open space commitments this land will be permanently taken off the tax roles and require some level of ongoing management in perpetuity.

8. How efficient is the County at running things?

• Pima County Sportspark, 6901 N. Casa Grande Highway, will shift to being managed by a contractor instead of the county, Payan said. The county will keep up the grounds Mondays through Fridays but has asked for bids on managing the site after hours, including scheduling the sports leagues and running the concession stands, Payan said.

This arrangement will allow the county to recover the costs of maintenance, and leave the management costs to a third party for up to $500,000 savings, Huckelberry said.

The number of employees in Pima County who earn more than $100,000 a year has nearly doubled since 2006. That’s despite the rocky economy and layoffs of thousands of people in the area during that time.
In 2006, 76 staffers in the county earned six-figure salaries.
Now the count is at 142 — an 87 percent increase at a time when the county is slashing costs to deal with declining tax revenues and state cuts. ……
County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry says the number of highly paid employees is appropriate for the variety of services the county provides.