Drive To Double 'Soda Tax' To 2 Cents Will Be On Ballot After Procedural Vote By City Council

BERKELEY,CA — Berkeley residents will decide in November whether to double the city's tax on distributors of sugar-sweetened beverages from one cent per fluid ounce to two.

A citizen-led initiative triggering the measure was formally placed on the ballot by the City Council at its regular meeting Tuesday.

The measure would also change the way the money is used by restricting the funding to specific expenditures, rather than the current method of contributing the tax to the general fund.

The tax is charged to distributors who sell to retail outlets, which often pass along the markup to consumers.

The initiative is being supported by some of the same backers as the first campaign, including the Berkeley Healthy Child Coalition, a grassroots group of residents, according to its website.

Berkeley was the first city in the nation to enact a sugar-sweetened tax on retail distributors of sodas and other drinks in 2014 with a voter-approved initiative that was extended indefinitely in 2024.

Other cities in California and around the nation followed suit, with Oakland, San Francisco and Santa Cruz among them.

State lawmakers tried to impose a 12-year ban on cities enacting such taxes in 2018, despite objections from health organizations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Heart Association.

Those organizations and others have supported taxes on sugar-sweetened beverages as a way to reduce tooth decay, diabetes, heart disease, obesity and a range of other health impacts.

The state Legislature passed the "Keep Groceries Affordable Act of 2018" in response to pressure from beverage industry lobbying groups such as the American Beverage Association, which has opposed such taxes.

But a Sacramento County Superior Court judge ruled in May that the provision of the law that tried to prevent the taxes, which sought to withhold certain other money if cities enacted them, violated the state constitution.

The ruling came in response to a challenge by the American Beverage Association and others to Santa Cruz's tax.

The increased tax level in Berkeley of two cents per fluid ounce is projected to bring in about $2.2 million a year, up from about $1.6 million at the current rate.

The money would go toward cooking, gardening and health education programs in the Berkeley Unified School District, and fund community grants with the same goals.

Those are already the recipients of the bulk of the funding, but the measure would make that permanent under a special fund. The Public Health Division would also continue to receive a portion to oversee and measure the programs' progress in improving health.

Raising the tax to two cents is also expected to further decrease consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages, which already declined more than 50% in the city of Berkeley since the 2014 tax was enacted, according to the city.

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