1. Sales tax election legal opinion

No ordinance or resolution may be adopted by the Board of County Commissioners implementing any new or additional tax not currently being levied or assessed until referred by the Board of County Commissioners for approval by the electorate at any regular county election. (emphasis added) The 1/2-cent sales tax proposed by the GFMEDC triggers the provisions in HRC Art.9, 92.2. The HRC does not define the word "regular" as used in 92.2. In order to clearly discern the meaning of the word in that context, I examined the underlying effort to develop the HRC. That development effort began in the early 1990's. The initial HRC Commission created at least eight drafts of the HRC. In the intermediate drafts it proposed language similar to the current Art. 9. For example, in the Fourth Draft the language required any new taxes be referred to the electorate at "any regular or special county election". That language continued through the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Drafts. However, in the Eighth Draft the language was amended to remove the words "or special". The remaining language, "any regular county election", was reflected in the HRC submitted to the electorate in June 1992. The reasoning behind the change in the Eighth Draft is not captured in any documents I reviewed (however, see "Recollections" below). Nonetheless, the initial HRC Commission made a conscious effort to exclude the opportunity to hold a "special" election under Art. 9, 92.2. A majority of the electorate voted against implementing the HRC in 1992. However, in 1994 another HRC Commission (with some of the same members) renewed the development effort. A revised HRC was approved by the electorate in November 1994. The language in Art. 9, 92.2 of that version, which is our current version, mirrors the pertinent language in the 1992 version - namely requiring that new taxes be referred to the electorate at any "regular county election". Other Sources In addition to reviewing the HRC development effort, for further context I reviewed other sources of information including, among others, the following: · Common dictionary: A common dictionary defines "regular" as follows: "usual, normal, customary"; "recurring at fixed times, periodic"; "characterized by... uniform procedure"; "occurring with normal frequency", among other wording. Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary, 1996 Ed. · Legal dictionary: A legal dictionary defines "regular" as: "steady or uniform in course, practice or occurrence"; "usual, customary or general"; among other wording. Black's Law Dictionary, 5th Ed.