Could voters roll back Pierce County’s public safety sales tax? What we know
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Council repeal needs majority; imposing tax or adding sunset needs supermajority
- Any legal voter or voters' organization can file an initiative proposal.
- Validated initiatives go on the next general election unless council enacts it.
Three days after the Pierce County Council narrowly passed a 0.1% public safety sales tax, the Pierce County Republican Party took to Facebook, asking the public, “You ready for an initiative to force the recent sales tax to a vote of the people? Stay tuned.”
Members of the Pierce County Republican Party, including Chair Dave McMullan, did not respond to multiple requests for comment from The News Tribune about the issue.
It raises the question: What would it take to repeal the Pierce County public safety sales tax? And what would need to happen to put the issue on the ballot for the public to vote?
Pierce County staff pointed The News Tribune to the Pierce County charter for answers. Under Section 5 of the charter, any legal voter or organization of legal voters in Pierce County can file an initiative proposal to the county. Once the proposal is filed with the filing officer (who transmits a copy to the Prosecuting Attorney), the Prosecuting Attorney “shall formulate a concise statement, posed as a positive question, not to exceed 20 words, which shall express and give a true and impartial statement of the purpose of the measure.”
The petitioner then has 120 calendar days to collect signatures of registered voters in the county in support of the measure, per the code. Signatures gathered must include no less than 10% of the number of votes cast in the county for the last election of the office of the executive. In 2024, there were 409,389 votes cast in that election, meaning the petitioner would need to collect at least 40,939 signatures in favor.
Once those signatures are collected, the filing officers would verify the signatures, and, if validated, submit the proposal to the people at the next general election “that is not less than 120 calendar days after the submittal of signatures to the filing officer for validation, unless the Council enacts the proposal without change or amendment,” per county code.
If the Pierce County Council chooses not to adopt the proposed measure and adopts a substitute measure on the same subject instead, “the substitute proposal shall be placed on the same ballot with the initiative proposal; and the voters shall be given the choice of accepting either or rejecting both,” per the code.
Before the Pierce County Council vote on March 3, Republican council members asked county staff questions whether the public safety tax could be repealed or “sunsetted” — terminated automatically after a certain date. Council administrator for legal and research, Susan Long, said on March 3 that the council could repeal ordinances that it has passed, but the vote requirement to do so is unclear in the charter.
Julie Murray, executive counsel to the county executive, said on March 3 the council could put a sunset clause in the ordinance, but it would still require a supermajority vote to pass because the council is imposing a tax.
Murray said it would take a majority vote, not a supermajority, to repeal the public safety tax.
This story was originally published March 17, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
