Mayor Kenney Cites Differences In Circumstance Between His And Nutter's Soda Tax Proposals
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Lines are already being drawn on the idea of a soda tax in Philadelphia and it hasn't even been officially proposed yet. The tax is in the budget the mayor will present to city council on Thursday.
Mayor Jim Kenney will propose a tax of 3 cents an ounce, which Finance Director, Rob Dubow, says would generate $95 million a year. The bulk of that money -- about $52 million a year -- would fund universal pre-K.
Another chunk would pay debt service on 400-Million dollars in bonds the city would issue to fund investments in parks, recreations, libraries and an energy authority.
About $8 million would be used to create community schools and the rest -- an estimated $5 million -- would go to stabilize the pension fund.
"In order to make these really essential investments, we needed a new source of revenue," Dubow said.
The teamsters wasted no time dumping on the proposal, predicting job loss and consumer revolt and accusing the mayor of flip-flopping since he opposed a soda tax as a councilman.
The teamsters have vowed to exhaust every available resource to defeat the plan, calling it unfair and illegal. They predict soft drink distributors will relocate outside the city.
Kenney says this time around is different.
"There are more identifiable projects that this money will pay for that were not in existence seven years ago," Kenney said. "We're talking about things that people elected to the administration and elected me to do."
Kenney found support from Comcast executive David Cohen, who called on the business community to support funding measures for pre-K.
Mayor Kenney calls the profit margin in soda, and other drinks with added sugar, "obscene," and says three cents an ounce, which would be levied on the distributor, not at the point of sale, is not unreasonable. That's a different tune than the mayor was singing when the Nutter administration proposed two cents an ounce.
