“Philadelphia Council Introduces Bill To Phase Out Soda Tax”

It’s the headline the soda industry has been thirsting after. While it won’t cause diabetes, obesity, or tooth decay, it may very well give Philadelphia a nasty hangover. 

Leaving aside the fact the bill is the culmination of an expensive misinformation campaign by the soda industry that has already cost the City millions of dollars, taken at face value the bill is deeply troubling.

The bill patently ignores 43 hours of council hearings where every detail of a soda tax was studied and debated and proposes to replace it with…nothing.

Reckless showboating. Tortured logic. Pandering to millionaires.

It’s definitely an election year.

What else could explain the introduction of a vacuous bill that could either wipe out the gains the City has made to expand high quality pre-K to thousands of children or swing open the door to another tax hike?

As a leading member of the coalition that pushed council to invest in these vital services, we’d be remiss if we didn’t remind Council that a dedicated tax was the only way to make pre-K happen in an otherwise cash-strapped City.

This week Councilperson Maria Quiñones-Sánchez introduced Bill 190183, which could phase out Philadelphia’s history-making Soda Tax, which, in addition to pre-K, funds badly needed repairs and refurbishment to the City’s child-serving infrastructure, including libraries, parks, and playgrounds.

The supporters of the bill are backing a Soda Tax repeal without a clue as to what that would look like or how to pay for pre-K without it. A quick scan of the proposed legislation (see above) reveals a likely phase-out of the tax by 2021, but actual blanks where one would hope numbers would be.

How is it possible for the seven members of council who claim to be acting out of fiscal responsibility support such a measure without an actual plan? How likely is it that this move won’t result in the loss of thousands of pre-K seats, a hike in existing taxes, or cuts to already threadbare City services?

It’s especially disappointing to see that Cindy Bass, Blondell Reynolds Brown, and Allan Domb, all of whom enjoyed the credit for supporting pre-K by voting for the tax in the first place, lose their resolve this week.

While not entirely out of the blue, we are surprised to see Brian O’Neill, David Oh, and Al Taubenberger, who voted against the soda tax, back such a nebulous bill.

Governing is hard, no doubt. Regardless of their intentions, to support this bill that robs Philadelphia families of the brighter future they were promised while benefiting a multi-billion dollar industry and their millionaire captains, members of City Council ought to tread carefully this election year.