There is plenty of opportunity for vetoes in the budget and
municipal relief bills; these are the items that fall within the CLT
mission.
1. The Overlay exclusion from Proposition 2˝: This would
increase property taxes in all communities, by, on average, 1.7%. It
makes Prop 2˝, on average, Prop 4.2.
A full explanation of this issue in on our website, www.cltg.org.
The Senate lets the communities raise the property tax at the will of
the chief executive officer, which is probably unconstitutional anyway
because only the legislative branch can raise a tax; the House
requires a referendum vote. But the issue is too complicated for a
fair election. If communities want the extra $160 million, they can
ask now for general overrides for their share of that amount, in a way
that voters would understand, instead of playing games with the
abatement account. Governor Weld vetoed the Overlay exclusion three
times; we hope you will veto it too no matter which version comes out
of conference committee.
2. The Finneran power-grab: This bill gives the Speaker
control over another 2/3 of the membership, those who hope to be the
next in line for extra pay at his discretion. We – you and we
taxpayers -- will lose what little ability we have to sustain a veto.
The "compromise" that is offered means nothing; absolute
power is always renewed. We hope you will veto this assault on Beacon
Hill’s balance of power.
3. Local option taxes: Letting voters decide is fair when
they are the ones being taxed. And most of us can simply avoid those
communities that raise the taxes, though this is hard on local
restaurants and other innocent tax-collectors. However, people who
work but don’t vote in the city of Boston will be taxed without
representation.
4. Education: Charter schools, MCAS and the voters’ will
on bilingual education should be supported with vetoes of the changes.
We also support keeping the work requirement in welfare reform.
5. The Resor amendment to the municipal relief package (roll
call 25-12): Incredibly, some communities that have passed debt
exclusions are attempting to raise extra taxes to cover the interest
costs at the time of the override vote, not the actual interest
required to be paid when the project is finally bonded. If there is a
bond premium, the towns are pocketing the rest of the money. We
understand that the Division of Local Services is refusing to certify
the tax rate for these towns, so the Resor amendment says that the
towns cannot do this anymore – after this year.
We like codifying the DLS opposition for next year. But taxpayers
in these communities will be paying more than they should for a given
project that they were "nice" enough to support. Maybe
DLS will have some idea on how this can be worked out to discourage
the present cheating.