The county budget season comes to a head Monday, June 5, with a vote on a proposed wheel tax hike by the Shelby County Commission.

The $50 increase needs a nine-vote two-thirds majority to be approved. And, if approved, it then must clear another vote three weeks later with nine votes again.

The commission cannot call a special meeting to vote on the increase. Under terms of the county charter, it must pass with nine votes at two consecutive regularly scheduled meetings.

Behind the Headlines: County Commission chair counts votes on wheel-tax hike

The Monday meeting and the June 26 meeting are the last two regular meetings of the body ahead of the July 1 start of the fiscal year.

The proposal by Mayor Lee Harris to dramatically restructure the capital budget to go from $75 million a year to $150 million a year beyond the rest of his term of office is built on generating an estimated $34 million in new revenue with the wheel tax hike.

The most immediate projects at stake are $350 million in county government funding as the first money in on a $750 million rebuilding of the Regional One Health campus and funding to build new high schools in Cordova and Frayser.

Harris sought a “go forward” resolution in March to come up with a plan to generate more revenue for the projects. The commission approved it, but it wasn’t an endorsement of the wheel tax hike he proposed – although Harris said the wheel tax would likely be what he would propose over a property tax hike proposal.

Harris’s campaign for the wheel tax hike has been the most concerted effort so far of his five years in office toward a legislative goal.

He’s included endorsements from former county mayors Mark Luttrell, Jim Rout and AC Wharton, specifically for the rebuilding of Regional One’s campus.

Luttrell urged the commission to find a way to fund the county-owned hospitals needs in committee sessions last week.

He also drew pushback from Commissioner Amber Mills.

Regional One CEO presents vision to Shelby County leaders

“Why didn’t you support Regional One when you were mayor?” she asked Luttrell.

“We were focused on stabilizing Regional One,” he replied. “We didn’t think the timing was right to pursue construction of a new facility at that time. … I think we’ve reached that point.”

Luttrell also said his support of a rebuilding of Regional One doesn’t include taking a position on the wheel tax hike.

“I know that if we want a new facility, it’s going to cost money,” he told commissioners. “There are many different avenues for you all to pursue.”

“What I’m hearing is we’re not ready to consider a wheel tax,” Mills replied. “Everyone supports Regional One. Our dilemma here is how we fund it.”

“What I’m hearing is we’re not ready to consider a wheel tax. Everyone supports Regional One. Our dilemma here is how we fund it.”

Shelby County Commissioner Amber Mills

Commissioner Erika Sugarmon says the wheel tax is “regressive.”

“We are going to fund it,” she said of Regional One. “But not this way.”

Commissioner Britney Thornton says the commission’s decision on funding needs to consider more than just the goal of new buildings.

“The funding path forward has implications beyond health care,” she said. “The idea of having a state-run operation, there’s a lot more to this that has to be thoughtfully constructed. It’s not just about whether you support Regional One.”

Harris has said county funding to the tune of $350 million over five years would come with an academic health authority that would make the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center – and with it, the state – co-owners of Regional One. It would also bring state funding in Gov. Bill Lee’s next budget proposal.

New push for two-year property reappraisals

Thornton wants assurances that what Harris has described as county government’s largest public works project will see Black-owned firms get a large share of the contracts for the construction project along with more job opportunities and job training for Black Memphians in the rebuilt hospital.

Harris, in response, outlined a series of steps that would include County Commission oversight of the contracting process Regional One officials would run.

A woman from Hernando who talked in last week’s committee sessions about how Regional One’s trauma center saved her life hit a nerve with some commissioners. That has surfaced repeatedly since Harris first outlined the county commitment to rebuilding the institution.

Mills said Mississippi state officials should come up with some funding for the project and should face the same kind of lobbying the County Commission is getting. The trauma center sees patients from the three-state area within a 400-mile radius of the city.

“What are you doing to reach out to your electeds in Mississippi to fund Regional One?” she asked. “This can’t all fall on the citizens of Shelby County with a $50 wheel tax hike.”

Suburban superintendents hope for increased county funds

County chief administrative officer Harold Collins has said the hospital is owned by the county and the state funding to come is contingent on the county money coming first.

He has also said the county is working with the city’s two congressmen, Steve Cohen and David Kustoff, to work with congressmen from Mississippi and Arkansas to secure funding from those two states.

Commission Chairman Mickell Lowery says the key to the other state and even federal funding is that the county money comes first.

“We would love to have a letter from the governor that says, ‘This is what we are going to do,’” he said on the WKNO-TV program “Behind The Headlines.” “Unfortunately, that’s not the way it works. I’ve had conversations with many people or representatives at the state. I know they’re committed. I believe the state will have some involvement in it.”

Meanwhile, if the wheel tax hike proposal falls short Monday, there are other options that would probably be a mixture of budget cuts and other new revenue sources short of a county property tax hike.

Commissioner Mick Wright, who campaigned for the Regional One Health funding with Harris but not necessarily a wheel tax hike, has a set of budget cuts waiting for consideration should the wheel tax come up short of nine votes.

Wright, a Republican, joined Harris, a Democrat, at several community meetings in support of the capital restructuring ahead of Harris formally proposing the wheel tax hike.

And Harris committed to combine the wheel tax hike with some spending cuts. He proposed lowering the property tax rate from the current $3.39 to $3.38.

Regional One could become the Mid-South’s first academic medical center

But so far, the commission has approved keeping the rate at $3.39 through two of the three votes on the ordinance that set the county tax rate. The third and final vote on the tax rate is also on Monday’s agenda.

Wright also amended the wheel tax resolution to specify that all of the revenue from the increase must go to finance capital projects either through debt service or a pay-as-you-go fund where the revenue is saved to pay what amounts to cash for capital projects instead of debt from bonds.

Pay-as-you-go funding is usually used for smaller capital projects.

The commission meets at 3 p.m. Watch a live stream of the commission meeting. Here is the agenda. Click on an item for documents offering more detail. Follow @bdriesdm for live coverage of the meeting.