San Diego City Council members on Monday rejected a proposed November special election for a hotel tax increase to expand the convention center and boost money for homeless programs and street repair.

The 5-4 vote along party lines — five Democrats opposed to a special election and four Republicans in favor — makes it highly likely the council will also reject a November vote on the SoccerCity proposal in Mission Valley.

The Monday vote was to reject having a special election this year for any ballot measures. The council is still scheduled to vote next Monday whether to adopt the SoccerCity proposal or, as expected, send it to the voters, likely sometime next year.

While council members have expressed a preference for November 2018, the actual timing of the election would be determined at a subsequent meeting, Deputy City Attorney Sharon Spivak said.


Council President Myrtle Cole committed after Monday’s vote to the council revisiting the convention center proposal this fall, with many council members expressing optimism it could be presented to voters in November 2018.

The council’s decision is a setback for Mayor Kevin Faulconer, a Republican who spearheaded the convention center measure and aggressively lobbied the council’s five Democrats in recent days to call a special election this November for both the convention center and Soccer City.

On the convention center, the council majority agreed with Faulconer that it needs to be expanded and that homelessness is a glaring local problem, but said a public vote in a higher-turnout general election would be more appropriate.

“I want to see a thoughtful, well-crafted measure on the November 2018 ballot,” said Councilwoman Barbara Bry, contending more negotiation with community leaders is needed before then. “It’s hard work and this is what we need to do to pass a successful measure.”


Other reasons the council majority cited include that a special election would cost an estimated $5 million, the city doesn’t control the land for the proposed expansion and that polling indicates the measure would struggle to get the two-thirds approval required.

The measure would have been subject to that higher approval threshold because money specifically for the convention center expansion, homeless programs and street repair would have come from an increase in the city’s hotel tax — formally called a transient-occupancy tax.

A general tax increase with no specifically targeted spending would require only simple-majority approval.

Critics also noted that polls universally show that voters oppose special elections, where turnout is typically much lower than general elections such as one scheduled for November 2018.


Some of the council’s Democrats have also complained that the proposal doesn’t include wage rules favored by labor unions, such as local hire requirements and a project labor agreement.

Supporters of the measure emphasized the many jobs expanding the convention center would create and the millions in additional revenue it would bring the city. They say delaying the expansion will increase the price tag as construction costs rise.

They also focus on the urgency of addressing the city’s growing homeless problem and stress that the hotel-tax hike would be paid almost exclusively by out-of-town visitors — not local residents.

Before Monday’s vote, Mayor Faulconer urged the council to call a special election this November on the convention center expansion and SoccerCity, a citizens’ initiative that would redevelop the Qualcomm Stadium site.


“The economic growth from a larger convention center will generate millions of dollars of new tax revenue for our city,” he said. “If you want to address one of the No. 1 issues your constituents call you about, vote yes because this measure will bring in $10 million for road repair next year. If you want to tackle the homeless crisis now, vote yes and allow voters to take action on an emergency that they see on our streets every single day.”

Faulconer said the public should get a chance to weigh in, complaining that the council was thwarting democracy.

“Shouldn’t voters be able to express their opinion this year on issues that I think all of us agree are significant to our city?” he asked. “Only the voters know what they will or won’t support, so I urge you not to take the decision out of the hands of your constituents.”

Supporters of the convention center proposal sent thousands of “robocalls” over the weekend to residents in the council districts of three Democrats opposed to a special election this year: Bry, Cole and Chris Ward.


Councilman Chris Cate, one of the Republicans voting in favor of a special election, took issue with criticisms of special elections that contend the largest number of voters possible should make the city’s most important decisions.

“Whether it’s low turnout or not, we are still providing an opportunity to have democracy in the city of San Diego,” he said.

Critics of a special election point to Measure L, a successful November 2016 ballot measure that said initiatives and referendum votes shouldn’t take place during low-turnout special elections.

However, supporters of a vote this November on the convention center measure point out that the proposal is a legislative action — not an initiative or referendum — so Measure L shouldn’t have applied.


The convention center proposal was the latest in a long series of attempts to expand the waterfront facility, with the most recent dying in 2014 when a judge ruled unconstitutional a plan to finance the expansion with an hotelier-approved room tax hike.

The new proposal would have increased San Diego’s relatively low hotel tax rate by 1 to 3 percent depending on proximity to the convention center. It would have expanded the size of the convention center to more than 1.2 million square feet from the current 816,000 at an estimated cost of $630 million to $685 million.

Homeless advocates were divided on calling a special election.

Some said it would make more sense to put a tax increase on the ballot that would raise money exclusively to combat homelessness, instead of combining it with a convention center expansion and street repair.


Deacon Jim Vargas of Father Joe’s Villages, however, said the mayor’s proposal would help solve the city’s homeless crisis by tripling the amount of annual funding dedicated to the problem.

“At its core, the issue of homelessness is one of resources,” Vargas said. “This measure won’t solve our region’s homeless problems, but it finally — after all these years — would give the city a dedicated funding source. We can’t afford to wait.”

Tourism industry representatives praised the convention center proposal on Monday.

They stress that tourists provide the city $200 million in tax revenue each year and said that number would sharply increase with an expanded convention center and higher hotel tax.


They also note that tourism employs 184,000 San Diegans —13 percent of the jobs in the county — and that visitors spend nearly $10.4 billion annually at local businesses.

After the vote, the chief executive of the San Diego Lodging Industry Association expressed frustration.

“The tourism coalition is disappointed some council members chose a narrow special interest today instead of doing what’s best for San Diego,” said Mike McDowell. “Without an alternative, they turned down a plan that included a billion dollars for homeless services and a billion more for road repairs, not to mention the city services a modern and expanded convention center would pay for in every neighborhood.”

In contrast, a coalition of labor, community and environmental groups called “Build Better San Diego” had several speakers lobby the council against a November vote.


They suggested instead a 2018 ballot measure that would raise about $1 billion to increase the local supply of affordable housing.

They also balked at descriptions of the coalition by critics.

“We are not special interests,” said group member Emily Serafy Cox. “We are members of the community with families.”

SoccerCity supporters also lobbied the council because they said the council’s Monday decision on a special election would almost certainly determine whether a SoccerCity vote would be this year.


SoccerCity spokesman Nick Stone said voters should get a chance to weigh in on the project this November.

He also said investors in the project agreed on Monday to abide by a recent appraisal that values the Mission Valley land at $110 million, significantly more than some previous estimates.

A group opposing SoccerCity called “Public Land, Public Vote” said delaying a vote on the project would give the city time to move forward with an open and transparent process for soliciting competing proposals.

The council’s five Democrats foreshadowed their Monday votes last week by removing $5 million Faulconer had put in the city budget for a special election.


Faulconer used his line-item veto power on Friday to restore that money. But Council President Myrtle Cole has called a special meeting on Tuesday to potentially override that veto, which would take at least six of the council’s nine votes.

david.garrick@sduniontribune.com (619) 269-8906 Twitter:@UTDavidGarrick