HUNTINGTON BEACH – Voters put this tax on their bills and it may be up to them to take it off.

Mayor Don Hansen has launched an effort to push for a ballot measure this November that could remove a property tax assessment that goes to help pay for some public safety employee pension costs.

Huntington Beach is the only city in Orange County with this type of tax, he said. The assessment collects about $4 million every year.

Hansen said his effort is two-fold: to protect taxpayers and to persuade city employees to take up more of the responsibility when it comes to paying in to their pensions.

“I don’t think most people know about (the tax),” Hansen said. “Nor do they know what it’s going for. Nor do they know it’s got no protection for them.”

Critics of the ballot measure say it would leave a multi-million dollar hole in an already-strained budget that could lead to cuts across the board in city departments.

“I think it’s kind of irresponsible to put a ballot measure on that’s going to take away $4.1 million from the city budget without telling us how you’re going to replace that,” Councilman Joe Shaw said. “This is just going to be devastating.”

Hansen has received the go-ahead from the Secretary of State to pursue signature gathering. He sent out volunteers earlier this month to start collecting the 17,500 signatures to get the initiative on the ballot.

The pre-1978 public safety employee retirement benefits tax was approved by voters in 1966 in an effort to help the city recover some pension costs. After Proposition 13 was passed in 1978, the city could no longer collect this tax for any employees hired after 1978.

The city collects .015 on every $100 of assessed property value. On a property worth about $500,000, residents can expect to pay $75 a year to fund retirements, officials said. Currently, the city collects about 42 percent of what it is legally able and the council could opt to have the percentage taxpayers contribute increase with a majority vote.

Huntington Beach can legally collect .049 on every $100 of assessed property value, which would mean a resident with property worth $500,000 would pay about $246 a year.

The amount taxpayers are responsible for can be raised or lowered by a majority council vote.

Although this tax assessment only applies to pre-1978 employees, Hansen said if voters decide they no longer want to pay it, current employees would likely need to make concessions in their contracts.

He said he expects the council to negotiate hard to offset the revenue loss if this is approved by voters.

“By the time it’s effective, the (employee) contracts will expire again,” Hansen said. “It’s sad that I need to take away this sort of drug addiction to tax money that they should be trying to wean us off of … we should fundamentally agree that (employees) should pay their fair share of the benefits.”

Hansen tried to get the tax off property bills last year with a council vote, but his idea failed 2-5, with Councilman Matthew Harper the sole supporter

Huntington Beach Firefighters Association President Darrin Witt said he believes the move would only force to city to make more cuts.

“I’m a little disappointed (Hansen) would want to create some fiscal crisis… in the hopes that he’s going to force us as employees to solve the city’s problems,” he said.

He said he realizes voters may want to nix the tax that’s been on their property bills for decades, but added that the city should back out gradually because $4 million is too big of a hit to sustain, he said.

“We’ve forgone pay raises and we’re paying more into our retirements,” Witt said. “These are all steps we’ve done to try and help the city and to take another step, I think that’s irresponsible.”

But Harper said that’s why the council and city management are there: to work out the city’s finances.

“That decision is a decision that would be made by the Huntington Beach voters,” he said.

The Huntington Beach Police Officers Association did not respond to a request for comment on this story.

Exploding pension costs have been a contentious topic as cities across California try to finagle a way to keep their promised contributions to their employees while battling the impacts of a suffering economy. Huntington Beach’s unfunded pension liability, including the city’s supplemental pension fund and using the most recent available market value, is about $370.3 million, according to CalPERS valuation reports.

While the council has agreed in the past that all employees should pony up more money for their pensions, there has been dissention on whether recent efforts have been drastic enough.

Some council members have said they thought the unions were taking good first steps.

“Our employees gave us back $1.7 million this year,” Shaw said. “(Hansen) is just playing politics with our employees.”

But Hansen said he wants to see less of the responsibility on taxpayers. .

“I don’t think we can leave this tax in the hands of the council because … the majority is not showing the willingness to make the difficult decisions,” he said. “I’m not comfortable leaving it like that.”

Contact the writer: 714-796-7953 or jfletcher@ocregister.com