Proposition 218, known as the “Right to Vote on Taxes Act,” in 1996. (Jacks v. City of Santa Barbara (2017) 3 Cal.5th 248, 259.)

Proposition 218 added Article XIII C to the Constitution, imposing voter approval requirements for general and special taxes. (Id.) This ensured that charter jurisdictions (which were not clearly bound by Proposition 62) were subject to these requirements. (Id.)

In addition, Proposition 218 responded to Proposition 13’s failure to address traditional benefit assessments, as subsequently recognized by the California courts. (Id.) To that end, it added Article XIII D to the Constitution, which imposes certain substantive and procedural restrictions on taxes, assessments, fees, and charges “assessed by any agency upon any parcel of property or upon any person as an incident of property ownership.” (Cal. Const., art. XIII D, Sec. 3(a).) Among other things, article XIII D instructs that the amount of a “fee or charge imposed upon any parcel or person as an incident of property ownership shall not exceed the proportional cost of the service attributable to the parcel.” (Id., citing Sec. 6(b)(3).) “Article XIII D sets forth procedures, requirements and voter approval mechanisms for local government assessments, fees and charges.” (Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Ass’n v. City of Roseville (2002) 97 Cal.App.4th 637, 640.)

“Most recently, in 2010... state voters approved Proposition 26.” (Jacks v. City of Santa Barbara, supra, 3 Cal.5th at 260.) Proposition 26 “further expanded the reach of article XIII C’s voter approval requirement by broadening the definition of ‘tax’ to include ‘any levy, charge, or exaction of any kind imposed by a local government.’ (Cal. Const., art. XIII C, Sec. 1(e).)” (City of San Buenaventura v. United Water Conservation Dist.(2017) 3 Cal.5th 1191, 1200.)

“The definition contains numerous exceptions for certain types of exactions, including for ‘property-related fees imposed in accordance with the provisions of Article XIII D’ (Id., citing Sec. 1(e)(7)), as well as for charges for ‘a specific benefit conferred or privilege granted,’ or ‘a specific government service or product’ that is provided[] ‘directly to the payor that is not provided to those not charged, and which does not exceed the reasonable costs to the local government’” (Id., citing Sec. 1(e)(1) & (2)). “To fall within one of these exemptions, the amount of the charge may be ‘no more than necessary to cover the reasonable costs of the governmental activity,’ and ‘the manner in which those costs are allocated to a payor’ must “bear a fair or reasonable relationship to the payor’s burdens on, or benefits received from, the governmental activity.” (Id., citing Sec. 1(e).)

Interpretation of Tax Ordinances

“A city ordinance is the equivalent of a statute such that rules of statutory construction and interpretation apply.” (Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn. v. County of Orange (2003) 110 Cal.App.4th 1375, 1388; see Castaneda v. Holcomb (1981) 114 Cal.App.3d 939, 939–942.)