A special called meeting of the Pine Bluff City Council’s Ways and Means Committee Wednesday paved the way for the full council to consider extending the 5/8th cent sales tax for another seven years, adding a 3/8th cent tax for public safety which will be permanent and placing both items on a special election ballot later this year.
Two of the three members of the committee, Glen Brown Jr., and Lloyd Holcomb Jr. voted to send all four items to the full council with a do-pass recommendation. The third member of the committee, Steven Mays, was not present.
Those four items were on the council agenda Tuesday night but were pulled before the meeting began and Brown was asked to explain why the special meeting was necessary.
So-called community activist Jack Foster asked why there was a “rush” to put the tax on the ballot this year since the current tax doesn’t expire until 2024.
Foster then offered his opinion on why there were efforts to get the tax renewed now.
Responding to Brown saying that the people voted for the tax the last time because of the things Go Forward promised the public it would do with the tax money, Foster said the tax was a general sales tax and nowhere in the legislation approving it are references to Go Forward Pine Bluff.
