All Rise.
Look, I know journalists aren’t supposed to gush over their sources — we’re charged with being objective and all that — but … I keep getting indications about just how important one of the August COMO Magazine stories was. It’s the feature I wrote about retired Circuit Judge Gary Oxenhandler and his book, The Life of a Murder. I spoke on the phone with Judge O the morning of August 5, as we reminded each other that the date was 50 years to the day that 23-year-old Ernie’s waitress Becky Doisy disappeared.
It would be 35 years before Becky’s killer — Johnny Wright, the man whom she left her Columbia apartment with on that August afternoon — was brought to justice. The book is definitely a page-turner even if you’re not a fan of the true crime or cold case genre of books, films, documentaries, and podcasts that now stream from multiple sources. The story, the case, the characters — and especially the judge who wrote the book — are immensely intriguing.
Can a judge even write such a book? Knowing that was the first question he wrestled with before writing the first words told me even more about the esteemed jurist who, by the way, is also a fantastic writer and storyteller. I’m proud to give the highest recommendation possible for The Life of a Murder.
The next case on the docket for this month’s “Chat CBT” is the curious case of Columbia’s affinity for sales taxes, complaining about sales tax, and not voting when we’re asked whether sales taxes are a good way for local government to generate revenue. Now, back up just a sec, because I’m referring specifically to the August 4 special election where the city council proposed a 1-cent sales tax to fund public safety: police and fire staffing and hiring, new facilities for both, and finally beginning to pay down the massive shortfall in police and fire pension funds.
Opponents likened the sales tax to giving a new credit card to someone who had already maxed out several other credit cards. In other words, in their view, the city has a spending problem, not a revenue problem. The pension fund shortfalls didn’t happen overnight, and budget planning for public safety to keep pace with the city’s population growth hadn’t been happening. On the pro side, there really is no other source to tap for increasing revenue for public safety’s growing needs. Putting a sunset on the tax, rather than asking for a perpetual sales tax, might have assuaged the anti-Prop 1 crowd.
All the pros and cons aside, the fact is that the sales tax passed, by a hair, with 15,042 “yes” votes and 14,957 “no” votes. A difference of 85 votes.
The countywide voter turnout of 36.12 percent was perhaps buoyed by a massive, statewide groundswell of opposition to Amendments 4 and 5 — one would have gutted our initiative petition process, while the other would have allowed the General Assembly to phase out the state income tax, replacing it with potentially higher sales taxes on sundry services and items not currently subject to sales tax. But here’s where I want our mind’s eye to be laser-focused: the City of Columbia voter turnout, the percentage of the 85,439 registered voters who even bothered to cast a ballot — was 35.11 percent.
Complain, as you will, about city leadership, the budget process, and ways to nickel-and-dime expenses (without creating substantial savings, by the way), but also check your calendar to see if you actually cast a ballot on August 4. Barely one-third of our fine city’s registered voters decided for the remaining 64.9 percent — the ones who STAYED HOME on Election Day — that we will all pay an extra penny of local sales tax beginning January 1.
So next time you hear “the city is taxing us to death,” remind those listening that the city can only impose sales tax that we vote for. And by “we,” I mean only about one-third of us.
