By admin 
The failure of a half-cent transportation sales tax measure to qualify for the November ballot is a setback for a Sacramento region badly needing local road and transit improvements but lacking a way to pay for them.
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But what could hurt even more is that Sacramento may have missed its last chance to pass a tax before it gets even harder in the future.
Called the Safer Sac Streets Measure, backers were trying to use a relatively new loophole in the system to get this on the ballot in a way that required only majority approval. If the measure passed, backers hoped it could generate an estimated $75 million a year to expand funding for Regional Transit, with the other half to help fix and improve surface streets. Hopes were high that this money could have helped eliminate at least 26 traffic fatalities in Sacramento this year by June.
But the whole crusade fell apart when Sacramento County elections officials determined that an inadequate number of valid voter signatures on petitions had been gathered.
“This result is heartbreaking for all of us who have invested so much time, expense and energy into bringing this measure forward,” organizers wrote in a Friday email to supporters, reported The Bee’s Jennah Pendleton.
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California’s system of approving or rejecting local sales tax increases makes no sense whatsoever. It is harder to pass a tax increase when the money is targeted for specific purposes, with a two-thirds yes requirement, than one that is a blank check, which needs only majority approval. Common sense would suggest that a fair system should be the other way around.
This November ballot is the last one with a clear path for these citizen-led measures to sneak through with a 50% approval threshold. Statewide, taxpayer groups were planning an initiative to make this and other tax measures harder to approve. As a compromise, the groups stood down as Democrats in the Legislature placed on a measure, Proposition 43, that would require citizen-led tax measures to get two-thirds voter approval. The Democrats who voted for this compromise actually don’t want it to pass. It’s classic California electoral confusion at its zenith.
The last time Sacramento voters approved a sales tax increase was back in 2018, when voters approved Measure U. That is why the special sales tax increase proposal advanced by SaferSacStreets had so much riding on it.
What voters will do in November with Prop. 43 is anyone’s guess. Maybe it will remain easier for citizens to pass a tax increase on the ballot than for our elected officials, as goofy as that sounds. The only thing that’s certain is that Sacramento is on the sidelines this coming November. A window of opportunity has closed, maybe for good.
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This story was originally published July 27, 2026 at 3:58 PM.