CLT UPDATE
Thursday, February 25, 2009
Gov holds taxpayers, legislators hostage
Opposition to the governor's latest
plan was quick to surface from Marblehead resident Barbara Anderson
and her advocacy group Citizens for Limited Taxation.
"Forgive us if we aren't grateful for a 19 cents a gallon gas tax
increase because it isn't a 29 cents gas tax increase or a $7 toll hike.
We hope other voters won't fall for the 'scary expectations' scam," she
said in a prepared statement.
According to Anderson, the governor orchestrated the increase and timed
the release of his long-awaited transportation plan to coincide with a
Friday afternoon on the last day of a school vacation week and only days
before the state Turnpike Authority is set to vote on the toll hikes.
"With any con job, timing is everything," she said. "The Turnpike Board
is scheduled to vote on the giant toll increase next week. Scammed
voters are told that if the gas tax passes, there will be no toll
increase at all. A question remains: How dumb are we?"
The Lynn Daily Item
Friday, February 20, 2009
Tax cap advocate slams governor's gas hike plan
Patrick announced yesterday he wants to boost the gas tax by
a whopping 19 cents, upping the state tax from 23.5 to 42.5 cents and bringing
$600 million into state coffers. But in a little-noticed provision tucked inside
his proposal, the gas tax would automatically grow each year by the same
percentage as the rise in consumer prices.
“I can’t wait to see how this plays when we get into double-digit inflation,”
said Barbara Anderson of Citizens for Limited Taxation. “The
public response to this should be, ‘No, not until we get the reforms.’”
The $787 billion federal stimulus is expected to goose inflation by as much 2.5
percent a year, even if the economy bounces back, said Mark Zandy of Moody’s
economy.com.
“There is some concern that it will accelerate in 2011 and 2012,” said Zandy,
meaning state taxpayers could be hit by a double whammy - ever-growing hikes in
both consumer prices and the gas tax.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Deval Patrick revs up gas tax hike
|
 |
|
The Boston Herald
=
February 20, 2009
By Jerry Holbert |
A 19-cent-per-gallon hike in the state gasoline tax is better
than a 73-cent increase, which is the figure that would solve the state’s every
last transportation spending obligation, Gov. Deval Patrick said yesterday.
Well now, doesn’t that make everyone feel better!
Patrick acknowledges that now is a “crummy time” to ask people to pay more. But
he might actually have been able to sell beleaguered taxpayers on a modest
increase in the gas tax had it been just that - modest - enough to stave off
immediate financial ruin for the transportation agencies, and coupled with major
reforms and elimination of Turnpike tolls.
Instead, Patrick has asked taxpayers to accept paying nearly double the state
tax they pay now - the highest gas tax burden in the nation, guaranteed in this
plan to grow even higher...
Had the governor spent the past two years chipping away at meaningful reform -
had he dramatically trimmed the state government payroll, for example, and still
confronted this dilemma - taxpayers might be willing to entertain a gas tax
increase as a necessary evil.
But not one this size. And not as long as reform is still words on a piece of
paper.
A Boston Herald editorial
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Driven to extremes
Massachusetts motorists yesterday greeted the prospect of
paying the highest gas tax in the country with a mixture of anger, wincing
resignation, and measured support as a way to help fix the state's dilapidated
transportation system.
Governor Deval Patrick, who formally unveiled the proposal to raise the tax by
19 cents a gallon, seemed conflicted himself as he abandoned previous statements
opposing the gas tax hike or calling it ill-timed as families struggle through a
recession. Now, his proposal would not only raise the gas tax, but continue to
increase it yearly with the rate of inflation....
If approved by the Legislature, the increase would push the state's gas tax to
42.5 cents a gallon, just slightly more than New York's 41.3 cents, now the
highest in the country. With the 18.4 cent federal tax added in, Massachusetts
drivers may soon pay 61.9 cents a gallon in taxes....
"I think that he's vulnerable now of the charge of being a tax and spend
liberal," [Jeffrey M. Berry, a political scientist from Tufts University] said,
"whereas before he was just a liberal."
The Boston Globe
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Motorists cringe at gas tax plans
After recently opening his gas station on Route 110 in
Amesbury, Charlie Mabardy was far less than pleased to hear Gov. Deval Patrick
was pushing to raise fuel tax 19 cents a gallon. The hike would give the state
the distinction of having the highest gas tax in the nation, at 42.5 cents per
gallon.
"I just made a huge investment in Massachusetts when I bought the gas station in
Amesbury (Amesbury One-Stop)," Mabardy said yesterday. "This increase would be
devastating. People jump the border now to save four cents a gallon. To save
almost 20 cents a gallon, they will definitely go to New Hampshire. I hope they
fight this."
But as unwelcome as a tax hike is for Mabardy's Massachusetts stations in
Amesbury and Salisbury, Patrick's proposal is music to the ears of Seabrook
businessman Aboul Khan, who owns a Richdale Convenience Store and Gas Station on
busy Route 1....
New Hampshire's gas tax is already lower than its southern neighbor at 18 cents
per gallon, and it hasn't been raised since the 1980s. Although New Hampshire
Gov. John Lynch's recent budget proposal called for the increase of all present
state tolls, as well as a $10 increase in annual registration fees to support
the state's transportation needs, Lynch did not propose raising the gas tax....
Massachusetts could be losing other tax-related revenues, like sales, cigarette,
meal or liquor taxes, as Bay State families travel farther than normal and do
their weekly shopping in the Granite State.
The Newburyport Daily News
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Gas tax plan fuels frustration
The tax hike, the largest Mr. Patrick has proposed since
taking over as governor two years ago, would give Bay State drivers the highest
gasoline tax in the nation at 42.5 cents, topping New York’s 41.3-cent tax.
While Democratic legislative leaders did not criticize or endorse the tax hike
plan, Republican leaders trashed the idea. Assistant House Minority Leader
George N. Peterson Jr., R-Grafton, said he was dismayed the governor had decided
to “tax and spend” his way out of the state’s fiscal mess. House Minority Whip
Bradford R. Hill, R-Ipswich, said in addition to paying the higher gasoline tax,
under the governor’s plan, “We are going to be stuck with the tolls” at the
current level as well.
Telegram & Gazette
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Patrick seeks 19-cent gas tax hike
Neglected work to infrastructure called shocking
|
 |
|
The
Telegram & Gazette
=
February 21, 2009
By David Hitch |
No to the 19-cent increase in the gas tax.
No to the obscene hike in the tolls.
I know, the highest state gas tax in America will merely cost the “average”
motorist “one large cup of coffee a week.” It’s the least we can do for what
Deval calls the infrastructure - the bloated T pensions, the sticky-fingered
Mass Pike tolltakers and Troop E’s detail-inflated, six-figure salaries, not to
mention the “prevailing wage” scam - methadone-addled ditch diggers making $50
an hour.
How appropriate that Deval’s as-yet-unwritten legislation is called the
“Transportation and Economic Security Plan.”
Economic security, all right. For hacks and pinky-ring union thugs....
How stupid does Patrick think we are? As long as the Pike toll booths are up, we
are all held hostage, like that rich businessman shaken down by the “escort”
from Canton who kept blackmailing him every time she ran short on dough.
The Boston Herald
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Gas tax, Pike hike add fuel to fire
By Howie Carr
Gov. Deval Patrick’s transportation reform proposal is
dominated on the surface by a 19 cents per gallon increase in the state gas tax,
which is troubling enough. Scratch that surface and the plan contains other
ideas to raise eyebrows.
Future gas tax hikes would be tied to inflation, for example, virtually
guaranteeing an annual increase. The inflation provision wasn’t adopted the last
time the gas tax went up, which Patrick blames for deepening the financial hole
the transportation system is in today.
We imagine it has quite a bit to do with years of mismanagement and excessive
spending on worker benefits, but why quibble over details....
The gas tax increase is only part of the damaging equation.
A Boston Herald editorial
Monday, February 23, 2009
What lies beneath
You might think with all the doomsday headlines about
spending cuts, and with a slew of proposed tax increases under consideration at
the State House, that Massachusetts has carved deeply into its budget. You would
be wrong. Even after all the “cuts” are factored in, state spending in the
current year is on track to increase by half a billion dollars....
A higher level of taxation deprives individuals of dollars, leading to depressed
consumer spending and lower demand for products and services. When government
takes money out of a weakened economy, it creates a doom loop that feeds on
itself....
A succession of Republican governors going back to Bill Weld in 1990 understood
this basic economic maxim. The way they honored it was with a no-new-tax pledge.
This was important in convincing the world that we had shed the Dukakis-era
label of “Taxachusetts.” ...
Voter outrage is growing, but has been met with the same indifference that Marie
Antoinette showed for peasants. The “let them eat cake” attitude has been
updated for the modern palate by Patrick’s Transportation Secretary Jim Aloisi.
When the Pike imposed a $6 annual maintenance fee on FastLane transponder users,
Aloisi sniffed that it cost roughly the same as “a turkey sandwich with a little
side of pasta salad.”
For such insensitivity, Antoinette lost her head. Let’s hope Bay Staters are
more forgiving, but only with respect to their methods.
The Boston Herald
Monday, February 23, 2009
Efficiency cut short
State gov’t just grows
By Eric Fehrnstrom
Defending his plan to stick Massachusetts families with the
highest gasoline tax in America, Gov. Deval Patrick told CNN that he was merely
being “candid about our choices and none of them are pleasant.” Then, Patrick
put on his smug, “you’re not smart, you’re just pretending to be” face and
added:
“Grownups know that you can’t have something for nothing.”
Oh, really....
Most Bay Staters don’t want to pay 61 cents a gallon in gas taxes. And it’s a
safe bet that most of us don’t want a gas tax that goes up automatically every
year.
Because we disagree with him, Patrick implies that we are children, lacking in
an adult understanding of the world. “Grownups know” that they must support
Patrick’s massive $500 million tax increase in the middle of a recession, while
we children - cynical and dimwitted as well - resist the governor’s plan.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Gov adds insult to injury
His attitude offends
By Michael Graham
Lawmakers said the Mass. Turnpike Authority’s approval
Tuesday of $100 million in toll hikes imperiled Gov. Deval Patrick’s quest for a
transportation overhaul package that includes a 19 cent-per-gallon increase to
the 23.5-cent-per gallon gas tax, reduced personnel and benefits in the
transportation bureaucracy, and other new costs for motorists.
The turnpike board voted 4-1 Tuesday to approve the toll hikes, which board
members said would be reversed if Beacon Hill can agree on a gas tax increase
and transportation reforms, no small feat. The package calls for a two-tiered
toll increase, the first stage taking effect March 29, the second slated for
July 1....
Angry lawmakers from the Metrowest and North Shore areas said they had not seen
the motion on toll hikes prior to the board’s vote, and said backing in the
legislative branch for Patrick’s reform proposal would erode.
“Secretary Aloisi’s done a very good job of losing that support,” said Rep.
David Linsky (D-Natick)....
Tuesday’s Pike board meeting featured a series of testy exchanges between
Transportation Secretary James Aloisi, a Patrick appointee who chairs the board,
and Romney appointee and board member Mary Connaughton....
“You’re out-Matt Amorelloing Matt Amorello,” Connaughton said, referring to the
former state senator and turnpike chief who came under fire for his oversight of
the Big Dig and his management of turnpike affairs.
State House News Service
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Toll hike vote endangers Patrick reform package,
say House members
Blasting Turnpike officials for misrepresenting reforms,
several lawmakers soured yesterday to Gov. Deval Patrick’s plan to increase the
gas tax by 19 cents after Pike board members voted to hike tolls.
Patrick pointed to $31 million in savings at the Massachusetts Turnpike on
Friday through staff and overtime cuts, but more than half of the so-called
reforms were simply expired contracts.
“I don’t know where they’re going to get the votes from,” said Sen. Mark C.
Montigny (D-New Bedford) of Patrick’s plan. “I wouldn’t even consider a vote for
the gas tax right now. I have so little faith that we’ll get the dramatic
reforms we need.”
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Pols turn on Gov. Deval Patrick over gas tax
Board votes to increase Turnpike tolls
Members of the Legislature, who had asked the authority to
delay the vote, were furious at the Patrick administration, which controls the
Turnpike Authority, for pushing the hikes through before filing a gas tax bill
that could have averted them.
"This nonsense is either politically naïve or political hardball," said
Representative Thomas P. Conroy, a Wayland Democrat. "If you raise the tolls,
people do not trust the board to rescind a toll hike." ...
Without a gas tax or some other source of money, the authority predicts another
toll increase on or near July 2014, when debt payments - mostly from the Big Dig
- balloon.
Whether or not the first toll increase takes effect, the heavily indebted
Turnpike Authority will immediately begin spending thousands of dollars
preparing for a new toll rate.
The Boston Globe
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Turnpike OK's toll increases, awaits decision on gas tax
When it comes to taxes and tolls Bay State drivers and Beacon
Hill lawmakers are being offered a false choice....
The measure reads, in part:
“The Board shall take appropriate and prompt action prior to these effective
dates to revise or rescind all or a portion of the toll increases upon the
Commonwealth enacting legislation which provides dedicated alternative sources
of revenue to the Authority.”
In other words, if lawmakers approve a gas tax hike that is less than the 19
cents Patrick has demanded (but that still covers the Pike’s debt problems) the
board may repeal only “a portion” of the toll hike. And in this case we can only
imagine what “revise” means.
Lawmakers are right to think twice before they give in to the administration’s
unreasonable demands.
A Boston Herald editorial
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Pike strikes unfair deal
Deval Patrick did it. He raised your tolls yesterday.
It wasn’t the earlier Republican governors. It wasn’t the 90 percent Democrat
Legislature. It was Deval Patrick, the forked-tongue politician who in 2006
promised to cut your property taxes for you, and, I hate to repeat myself, but
how’s that one working out for you? ...
Five members make up the Turnpike board that approved this fiasco yesterday
afternoon. Three of them were appointed by Gov.
I’m-Going-to-Cut-Your-Property-Taxes....
He considered us. And then his appointees voted to rob us, yet again, at the
tollbooths that were supposed to come down in 1987. Deval now holds us hostage
to get himself the highest gas tax in America, and then he promises to rescind
the tolls. I predict we end up like most hostages - dead.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Pin the stickup at the tolls on Deval Patrick
By Howie Carr
I am writing to bring to attention to the citizens of the
commonwealth the irresponsible manner in which its state government is
responding to this recession. As you may know, the commonwealth's budget is
currently more than $2 billion short of revenues that were expected as early as
last July 1.
Many financial analysts and think-tanks reported that the budget passed for
fiscal year '09 was unsustainable. Despite those warnings, the majority party's
leadership went ahead and passed a budget that ultimately was out of balance to
the tune of $2.4 billion....
As we all know, many individuals are struggling due to high costs, unemployment,
reduced incomes and decimated values in investment savings. This is no time to
nickel-and-dime our citizens. Rather, these economic times call for
across-the-board reform and waste cutting as the first course of action in
balancing the budget.
The Salem News
Friday, February 20, 2009
Majority party not interested in 'sharing the pain'
By Rep. Brad Hill
 |
The Boston Herald
=
February 11, 2009
By Jerry Holbert |
From the bullet that smashed through a Lawrence City Hall
window to stinking fishes flung at the Gloucester mayor’s home, city and state
leaders are feeling the heat on the street from taxpayers and public sector
workers fuming over impending layoffs and service cuts....
“If someone is giving a message that you’d better watch out, that’s
disconcerting,” Lawrence Mayor Michael J. Sullivan told the Herald yesterday....
Meanwhile, at a gas station on Old Colony Avenue yesterday, State Rep. Brian
Wallace (D-South Boston) got an earful from a man incensed about Gov. Deval
Patrick’s proposed 19-cent gas tax hike.
“It’s gotten worse,” said Wallace, who also gets blistering e-mails from
constituents. “It’s taken a different tone, an edge. People are stretched to the
limit.” ...
Lynn’s [Mayor] Clancy said he’s steering clear of bars and other places where he
might run into angry taxpayers.
“When they have a few in them,” Clancy said, “they get a little - how do you say
- demonstrative.”
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Angry citizens open fire on pols
Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
Just five days ago
I wrote, "Who can keep up with all the new threats, outrages, scams,
and hypocrisy squeezed into just this one week in Taxachusetts? And
it's only just begun, taxpayers." Just five days ago I'd caught up
-- I thought -- with the massive volume of news from just the prior
week.
But it just keeps piling up
faster than I can shovel it.
Governor Deval Patrick has
decided to hold taxpayers and legislators hostage to his transportation
plan -- though he still hasn't filed it as legislation.
Nobody yet knows what he's really going to propose -- like a
weathervane, it keeps spinning with the breeze.
But that hasn't prevented
him from taking hostages. The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority's
board is stacked with Patrick appointees including James A. Aloisi Jr.,
state transportation secretary and its chairman. Aloisi has been a
longtime participant in and profited from the Big Dig scandal for
decades, and now he's Patrick's go-to guy for supposed "reform" of state
transportation -- if you can believe it even here in Taxachusetts,
through the looking glass.
Yesterday he rammed through
a big toll hike for the turnpike, the hostage for Patrick's massive gas
tax hike. The false choice -- either an extortionate toll hike, or
an extortionate gas tax hike -- has taken any reform off the burner, out
of the equation. Like a magician, this political sleight-of-hand
is intended to keep everyone's eyes distracted from the manipulation and
trickery.
All along we and others
have been demanding reform before any revenue increases are even
considered.
Where has reform gone?
No longer is the debate
whether reform will come first. We're back to a debate over
either/or a massive tax hike or a massive toll hike.
Is this a plot, or is this
just another typical example of ineptitude on Beacon Hill?
Barbara said to me, "It's a
Mexican standoff in the middle of a Chinese fire drill."
I see it being like herding
cats. As we've stated before, Patrick really wants the gas tax
hike, but needs to use the toll increase as leverage -- a club over the
head of the collective Legislature. Citizens, taxpayers, some in
the Legislature, and purportedly even the governor, want to see reforms
first -- however they define the term and to whatever extent.
Meanwhile, the Turnpike
needs to raise millions quickly from somewhere to avoid defaulting on
its misbegotten bonds. One way or the other, it's going to grab
all the cash it feels is necessary to remain solvent. If the
Legislature doesn't act quickly on the gas tax hike, then the Pike will
take its cash in toll hikes.
The Legislature, according
to a number of legislators in key positions, knows it must be perceived
as passing credible reforms convincing to the public before even
considering revenue increases from any source. But it hasn't
received the governor's transportation reform proposals in any
meaningful form -- just his "PowerPoint presentation," as Sen. Baddour
termed it. Until reforms can be implemented, the Legislature isn't
going to bring up tax hikes. So it runs in place, holds
meaningless hearings -- as if the pols don't already know how the public
feels without asking?
Watching how this stalemate
evolves is an enlightening lesson on Beacon Hill politics at its best.
But realize: Making reforms will be more difficult,
time-consuming, than kneejerk tax hikes are -- and if they get the gas
tax hike and/or toll increase or both without the reforms first, the
pressure for reforms will dissipate. Then all bets are off but for
perhaps token "reform" around the edges that legislators and the
governor can later point to as an accomplishment.
Without cutting every bit
of waste and mismanagement out of the system, not one cent of new
revenue should be permitted or even discussed. When there's no
more waste and mismanagement, after all the ridiculous pensions, pay and
perks are wrung out, when consolidation of redundant agencies is
accomplished and efficiencies are implemented -- then there should be no
need for increased revenue, certainly not of the magnitude being
threatened.
That our state's highway
and roadway infrastructure has been allowed to crumble for so long is
not the fault of the taxpayers. All along we've paid more than our
share to maintain it, but the pols had better uses for our money.
For years we've warned that this day would come if they didn't wake up.
Now that they've brought us here, we're expected to bail out their
ineptitude.
Patrick's PowerPoint
"solution" keeps getting worse.
His proposed massive gas
tax hike, we learn, will be indexed to consumer prices -- a gift that
keeps on giving. As Barbara pointed out to the Boston Herald
reporter, just think what that will mean in the days ahead, when -- not
if -- inflation roars in when the trillions of dollars of government
"stimulus" spending kicks in. One needs only recall the Jimmy
Carter presidency.
And as long as the Turnpike
Authority exists tolls will keep increasing. It is the perfect
cash cow, and the perfect ransom hostage. It will never, ever go
away. It's simply too useful to Bacon Hill.
Voters gave the state $12
billion last November by voting against Question 1, the income tax
repeal. The same newspapers that are now assailing these proposed
tax hikes and toll increases would again be railing against a ballot
question if Carla Howell called for repeal of them. The fact is,
those editorialists now have what they asked for, just as we warned all
along.
The natives are growing
restless. State government under the haughty Patrick
administration is underestimating the mounting anger, the desperation
among an increasing swath of overburdened taxpayers. Taxpayers
have run out of money and out of patience. Frustrated that nobody
in government is listening to them or recognizing the citizens' plight,
frustrated by no apparent options or alternatives, some are turning to
direct action, even violence. This is a new sign of the times, an
indication of the dire situation the Legislature must now confront.
My American Revolution
hero, colonial agitator Sam Adams, said: "It does not require a majority to
prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires
in people’s minds."
Today we have nothing else
as an option. Government is simply ignoring the citizenry,
squeezing taxpayers dry mercilessly. Let the brush fires again be
lit far and wide. The "people's minds" at last are opening to
them, seeking their light and comfort, out of pure self-interest and
naked survival if nothing else.
 |
|
Chip Ford |
|
|
State
income tax repeal ballot question:
Defeated 70-30% in November. |
|
 |
|
The Results Are In |
The Lynn Daily Item
Friday, February 20, 2009
Tax cap advocate slams governor's gas hike plan
By David Liscio
Gov. Deval Patrick on Friday proposed a 19-cent increase in the state
gas tax - making it the highest in the nation - as the best way to fund
Massachusetts' debt-ridden transportation system. He initially
insinuated that a 29-cent increase per gallon might be necessary or
perhaps doubling metropolitan bridge and tunnel tolls to $7.
Opposition to the governor's latest plan was quick to surface from
Marblehead resident Barbara Anderson and her advocacy group
Citizens for Limited Taxation.
"Forgive us if we aren't grateful for a 19 cents a gallon gas tax
increase because it isn't a 29 cents gas tax increase or a $7 toll hike.
We hope other voters won't fall for the 'scary expectations' scam," she
said in a prepared statement.
According to Anderson, the governor orchestrated the increase and timed
the release of his long-awaited transportation plan to coincide with a
Friday afternoon on the last day of a school vacation week and only days
before the state Turnpike Authority is set to vote on the toll hikes.
"With any con job, timing is everything," she said. "The Turnpike Board
is scheduled to vote on the giant toll increase next week. Scammed
voters are told that if the gas tax passes, there will be no toll
increase at all. A question remains: How dumb are we?"
Patrick's plan to reform a transportation system that is billions of
dollars in debt, due primarily to the Big Dig, avoids a proposed toll
increase on the Massachusetts Turnpike that caused public outcry when it
was approved in November. Patrick said the tax increase would raise
almost $600 million annually, though that wouldn't be enough to
completely eliminate tolls.
"We've tried to strike a balance between the most immediate needs where
we can put our transportation network on a more secure fiscal and
financial foundation without asking something unreasonable from
travelers," Patrick said. "All of it is tough and there's nothing here
that isn't a heavy lift."
The 19-cent increase gives the state a gas tax of 42.5 cents, which
Patrick said would address $5 billion of lingering debt at the
Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority and $2.2 billion in debt at
the Turnpike.
The proposed hike must be approved by the Legislature.
The governor has said earlier he would not seek a tax increase without
getting legislative support for overhauling the state's transportation
bureaucracy through reforms, such as abolishing the Massachusetts
Turnpike Authority.
"Reforms are as indispensable a part of this proposal as is the new
revenue," Patrick said. "We must have the reforms for reasons of
efficiency, for cost savings, for reasons of regaining the confidence of
the public and reasons of our long term strength."
Patrick's reorganization plan would create one Executive Office of
Transportation with four divisions: Highway, Rail & Transit, Aviation &
Port and Registry of Motor Vehicles. It also creates an Office of
Performance Management to ensure public accountability. The plan
eliminates 300 positions and ends special perks in the employee pension
system at the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.
The governor said his plan would make the transportation system more
environmentally responsible through steps such as increased investment
in public transportation outside Boston and adopting various standards
to build and buy in environmentally friendly ways.
Anderson said the information released by the governor has been
inadequate because it does not provide details on possible reforms. "For
19 cents a gallon, we would expect a whole lot of reforms - and should
demand that these be implemented before we see any possible increase at
the pump," she said, adding that the reforms should cancel the effect of
the new mandated pay raises for Turnpike workers. For example, she
suggested financial reforms include getting rid of toll collectors by
abolishing tolls or with increased automation, through benefit cuts and,
if all else fails, bankruptcy so that contracts can be renegotiated.
"It's time for Massachusetts voters to just say no to being scammed
again," she said. "Toll-payers and drivers are supposed to breathe a
sigh of relief, 'Only 19 cents!' If they don't breathe with gratitude
loud enough, the amount will drop to the governor's next best offer."
An earlier draft of Patrick's plan, obtained by The Associated Press,
proposed installing chips in vehicle inspection stickers to track
mileage driven on state roads and charge drivers a tax. Transportation
Secretary James Aloisi said the administration is asking the Registry of
Motor Vehicles to look into technology and initiatives for the program,
but did not have a time line for implementation.
Associated Press material was included in this report.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Deval Patrick revs up gas tax hike
Would link increase to inflation
By Hillary Chabot
Hidden deep inside Gov. Deval Patrick’s new plan is a fine-print
provision linking the gas tax rate to yearly inflation-fueled hikes in
the consumer price index, guaranteeing Bay State drivers will keep
getting hosed at the pump long after he leaves the Corner Office.
Patrick announced yesterday he wants to boost the gas tax by a whopping
19 cents, upping the state tax from 23.5 to 42.5 cents and bringing $600
million into state coffers. But in a little-noticed provision tucked
inside his proposal, the gas tax would automatically grow each year by
the same percentage as the rise in consumer prices.
“I can’t wait to see how this plays when we get into double-digit
inflation,” said Barbara Anderson of Citizens for Limited
Taxation. “The public response to this should be, ‘No, not until we
get the reforms.’”
The $787 billion federal stimulus is expected to goose inflation by as
much 2.5 percent a year, even if the economy bounces back, said Mark
Zandy of Moody’s economy.com.
“There is some concern that it will accelerate in 2011 and 2012,” said
Zandy, meaning state taxpayers could be hit by a double whammy -
ever-growing hikes in both consumer prices and the gas tax.
Patrick said yesterday that his proposed gas tax increase would avert an
unpopular toll hike, but he intends to leave all tollbooths on the Mass
Pike in place - in sharp contrast to his earlier pledge to take down
those west of Route 128. He’s also reportedly seeking to put tolls on
the border.
Patrick yesterday argued the current increase would cost the average
resident only $8 a month, or the cost of a cup of coffee a week.
“It’s clear to me that there is political risk in these proposals,”
Patrick said. “Our long-term job growth and economic security . . .
depend on both major reforms and new revenue now.”
Both Speaker Robert DeLeo and Senate President Therese Murray declined
to address the consumer price link, saying they needed to study it more.
But one Republican lawmaker predicted an ever-expanding gas tax would be
dead on arrival in the Legislature.
“I don’t think this will have a lot of support,” said Sen. Richard Tisei
(R-Wakefield) “It’s a pretty insatiable appetite as far as looking at
sources of revenue.”
Christy Mihos, who is considering challenging Patrick again in 2010,
said he sold off his Cape Cod-based gas stations to Hess earlier this
month because the state was too hostile to small businesses.
“I think it’s going to be very difficult for Deval Patrick to be
re-elected after this,” Mihos said. “It just makes it very difficult for
small businesses to flourish in the commonwealth.”
The Boston Herald
Saturday, February 21, 2009
A Boston Herald editorial
Driven to extremes
A 19-cent-per-gallon hike in the state gasoline tax is better than a
73-cent increase, which is the figure that would solve the state’s every
last transportation spending obligation, Gov. Deval Patrick said
yesterday.
Well now, doesn’t that make everyone feel better!
Patrick acknowledges that now is a “crummy time” to ask people to pay
more. But he might actually have been able to sell beleaguered taxpayers
on a modest increase in the gas tax had it been just that - modest -
enough to stave off immediate financial ruin for the transportation
agencies, and coupled with major reforms and elimination of Turnpike
tolls.
Instead, Patrick has asked taxpayers to accept paying nearly double the
state tax they pay now - the highest gas tax burden in the nation,
guaranteed in this plan to grow even higher - not only to get out from
under $7 billion in transportation-related debt but so that, among other
things, the state can spend more than $1 billion building commuter rail
to the South Coast.
Patrick’s proposal does contain overdue reforms, such as a plan to
gather the scattered transportation agencies under one umbrella.
It would rein in the outsized pension benefits that workers at the MBTA
enjoy - the “23 years and out” policy would be a thing of the past - and
eliminate about 300 jobs.
But those reforms are accompanied by a punitive tax increase that will
hurt businesses and families. Patrick notes that the cost to the average
driver, about $8 a month, is the same as a large coffee once a week. He
must have missed the stories about more people brewing at home.
Meanwhile a healthy chunk of the $500 million raised through the gas tax
hike would be used for new transportation spending, like the rail
project. And while Patrick has called for the new tax revenue to stave
off a proposed hike in Pike tolls (along with MBTA fare hikes), the
tolls themselves stay up.
Had the governor spent the past two years chipping away at meaningful
reform - had he dramatically trimmed the state government payroll, for
example, and still confronted this dilemma - taxpayers might be willing
to entertain a gas tax increase as a necessary evil.
But not one this size. And not as long as reform is still words on a
piece of paper.
The Boston Globe
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Motorists cringe at gas tax plans
Proposed 19-cent increase carries political risk for Patrick
By Noah Bierman and Eric Moskowitz
Massachusetts motorists yesterday greeted the prospect of paying the
highest gas tax in the country with a mixture of anger, wincing
resignation, and measured support as a way to help fix the state's
dilapidated transportation system.
Governor Deval Patrick, who formally unveiled the proposal to raise the
tax by 19 cents a gallon, seemed conflicted himself as he abandoned
previous statements opposing the gas tax hike or calling it ill-timed as
families struggle through a recession. Now, his proposal would not only
raise the gas tax, but continue to increase it yearly with the rate of
inflation.
Patrick, the first governor in two decades to propose a broad-based tax
increase placed much of the blame on his predecessors, saying that their
poor decisions and the "Big Dig culture" had left him and Massachusetts
residents with a painful choice: paying up or living with deteriorating
bridges, high subway fares, and $7 tunnel tolls.
"The days of avoiding the truth and the consequences must end and end
now," he said. "Don't just criticize from the sidelines and watch the
situation get worse, as those before us have."
If approved by the Legislature, the increase would push the state's gas
tax to 42.5 cents a gallon, just slightly more than New York's 41.3
cents, now the highest in the country. With the 18.4 cent federal tax
added in, Massachusetts drivers may soon pay 61.9 cents a gallon in
taxes.
The decision comes with political risk for Patrick, who has said he will
seek reelection next year. Proposing tax increases creates a broad
opening for a potential opponent, leaving him with an important sales
job in coming months.
"Look, this is not where Deval Patrick wanted to be in the third year of
his term," said Paul Watanabe, a political scientist at the University
of Massachusetts at Boston. "Assuredly, there will be a considerable
amount of distress raised by his proposal but . . . I think there are
plenty of people who recognize that in some ways the sky is falling and
something has to be done about it."
Patrick went to lengths yesterday to emphasize that his plan is about
more than raising taxes. He said he would not sign an increase unless
legislators pass the vast reorganization plan that goes with it, which
includes future reductions in MBTA fringe benefits and other changes
proposed two years ago by a government commission.
The plan also gives the administration more control over the state's
transportation agencies, by, for example, replacing the MBTA board with
a three-member committee that reports directly to the governor's
transportation secretary.
A bill has yet to be submitted to the Legislature laying out details,
but what administration officials have revealed - in bits and pieces to
various news outlets and interest groups - appears to include a wide
range of environmental, financial, and structural changes to attract or
offend nearly every constituency in the state.
For example, after the press conference yesterday, officials revealed
that they would reduce the toll discount that some Boston neighborhoods
get at the Harbor tunnels or the Tobin Bridge.
The tolls would cost at least $2 for those residents instead of the
current 40-cent fee at the tunnels and 30-cent fee on the bridge. At the
same time, Patrick would add Winthrop residents to the discount program,
which should help garner support from new House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo,
who represents that town in the Legislature.
The plan also includes a provision floated earlier this week to charge
higher vehicle registration fees for gas-guzzling cars and give
discounts to fuel-efficient vehicles.
But other previously announced plans to eliminate tolls on the western
portion of the Massachusetts Turnpike have been abandoned, as have plans
to shift the turnpike authority's debt to the agency that runs Logan
Airport.
Patrick explained some of the changes as tradeoffs in a tough
environment, where needs still outstrip the $500 million he hopes to
raise from the tax.
"All of it is tough," Patrick said. "There is nothing here that isn't a
heavy lift."
Legislators have been cautious but open to the bill, saying they were
eager to read details and begin debate.
DeLeo called it a "great beginning" while Republicans chided Patrick for
shifting his position.
Patrick put pressure on lawmakers to act soon. The turnpike authority
board is scheduled to vote on a hefty toll increase Tuesday that could
raise tolls in steps beginning March 29. Patrick said lawmakers could
act before that to avoid the hike or repeal the tolls increase later if
the bill does not meet the deadline.
Commuters, though unaware of the details, were beginning to take sides,
mostly depending on where they live.
"I mean, jeez, we just caught a break on the gas prices," said Kevin
Moore, a 48-year-old Cambridge resident, as he stopped for $10 worth of
regular at the Shell station on Memorial Drive. "I don't think it's a
good plan at all."
But over on the Massachusetts Turnpike, Eileen MacKenzie had a different
opinion: "I think the gas tax hike is a better idea, because from what
I've heard about the toll hike, it was really going to be very high for
the people that use it on an everyday basis. This is a little more
equal."
A Globe poll in December showed that a gas tax hike did not have
majority support, but was more politically palatable than toll hikes and
other possible sources of new revenue.
To sell the increase, Patrick has to keep making the case, standing next
to potholes around the state to demonstrate the need, said Jeffrey M.
Berry, a political scientist from Tufts University.
"I think that he's vulnerable now of the charge of being a tax and spend
liberal," Berry said, "whereas before he was just a liberal."
On the Pike, Joe Ciaramitaro did a quick calculation as he pumped 24.8
gallons into his wife's Lincoln Navigator. An extra 19 cents a gallon
would be nearly $5.
With three children and a job as a buyer for a seafood company, the
41-year-old Gloucester resident logs a lot of miles. The hike could cost
him $500 a year, he said.
"Between feeding, housing, clothing, and schooling, all I need is
another increase in my taxes," he said. "You just can't keep taxing
people to death."
The Newburyport Daily News
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Gas tax plan fuels frustration
By Angeljean Chiaramida
After recently opening his gas station on Route 110 in Amesbury, Charlie
Mabardy was far less than pleased to hear Gov. Deval Patrick was pushing
to raise fuel tax 19 cents a gallon. The hike would give the state the
distinction of having the highest gas tax in the nation, at 42.5 cents
per gallon.
"I just made a huge investment in Massachusetts when I bought the gas
station in Amesbury (Amesbury One-Stop)," Mabardy said yesterday. "This
increase would be devastating. People jump the border now to save four
cents a gallon. To save almost 20 cents a gallon, they will definitely
go to New Hampshire. I hope they fight this."
But as unwelcome as a tax hike is for Mabardy's Massachusetts stations
in Amesbury and Salisbury, Patrick's proposal is music to the ears of
Seabrook businessman Aboul Khan, who owns a Richdale Convenience Store
and Gas Station on busy Route 1.
"Definitely such a large increase in the gas tax would help us in
Seabrook and New Hampshire," Khan said yesterday. "People could come
here and save $4 or $5 to fill their tank. And while they're here in
Seabrook, they will stop and shop for all the other things we sell at a
lower cost than stores in Massachusetts."
If Patrick's proposal goes through, when combined with the 18.4-cent
federal gas tax, the change would leave Bay State drivers paying 60.9
cents in fuel surcharges on every gallon of gas they buy. But the gas
tax increase could also stave off a proposed doubling of Massachusetts
Turnpike tolls slated to take place this spring, assuming the
Legislature acts quickly to approve it.
The proposed increase is less than the 27-cent-per-gallon increase the
Patrick administration was considering last week. That hike was included
in a draft of the transportation announcement obtained by The Associated
Press and was the centerpiece for a variety of plans throughout the
document.
The 27-cent increase would have raised an estimated $702 million in
annual revenue; the 19-cent hike would generate $494 million. With the
smaller tax increase, Patrick will have less money to do what he says
the state needs to do: Make long-term, structural changes to the
transportation system and set the state on a course to long-term
transportation financing stability.
And that raises the specter of future gasoline tax increases.
New Hampshire's gas tax is already lower than its southern neighbor at
18 cents per gallon, and it hasn't been raised since the 1980s. Although
New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch's recent budget proposal called for the
increase of all present state tolls, as well as a $10 increase in annual
registration fees to support the state's transportation needs, Lynch did
not propose raising the gas tax.
However, that doesn't mean that during the months ahead, as Lynch's
budget is debated and changed by the New Hampshire House and Senate, a
gas tax increase won't be considered.
Domino effect
Mabardy sees the fuel tax hike having an impact on other taxable retail
products sold in Massachusetts. As more people travel the few miles to
buy gas in border communities like Seabrook, they may patronize local
supermarkets and other retail stores there — like the new Kohl's and
Famous Footwear retail stores about to open in Seabrook.
Massachusetts could be losing other tax-related revenues, like sales,
cigarette, meal or liquor taxes, as Bay State families travel farther
than normal and do their weekly shopping in the Granite State.
"I think there will be a trickle-down effect on everything," Mabardy
said. "There's a Subway (sandwich shop) at my gas station. They thrive
on gas customers. You're steering people away (from Massachusetts) with
this tax increase. Already, we hardly sell any cigarettes or beer here.
Most people travel to New Hampshire to buy those things."
According to Mabardy, when considering buying another gas station, he
had to estimate his income based on sales when considering his ability
to pay his employees and cover business expenses and his mortgage. Any
significant movement of his customer base in the competitive world of
fuel sales means that income could drop, he said, because gas income is
made by volume. There is only a small profit of a few cents per gallon
on gas, when taxes and expenses are considered, he said.
Associated Press writer Glen Johnson contributed to this report.
The Telegram & Gazette
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Patrick seeks 19-cent gas tax hike
Neglected work to infrastructure called shocking
By John J. Monahan
Gov. Deval L. Patrick yesterday made his case for a 19-cent hike in the
state gasoline tax, emphasizing the need to undertake long-neglected
repairs of the state’s transportation system, while acknowledging it is
“a crummy time” to raise a broad-based tax.
In a major development affecting Central Massachusetts, the governor
said he abandoned plans announced late last year to include the
elimination of Massachusetts Turnpike tolls west of Route 128 through
Central Massachusetts in the transportation reforms because it would
have required raising the gasoline tax even more.
As it is, he said, 4 cents of the increase would be needed to generate
$100 million to avoid pending toll increases inside Route 128 and at the
Boston Harbor tunnels.
The tax hike, the largest Mr. Patrick has proposed since taking over as
governor two years ago, would give Bay State drivers the highest
gasoline tax in the nation at 42.5 cents, topping New York’s 41.3-cent
tax.
While Democratic legislative leaders did not criticize or endorse the
tax hike plan, Republican leaders trashed the idea. Assistant House
Minority Leader George N. Peterson Jr., R-Grafton, said he was dismayed
the governor had decided to “tax and spend” his way out of the state’s
fiscal mess. House Minority Whip Bradford R. Hill, R-Ipswich, said in
addition to paying the higher gasoline tax, under the governor’s plan,
“We are going to be stuck with the tolls” at the current level as well.
In a speech to transportation leaders, the governor said the level of
neglect of state roads and bridges is shocking, because critically
needed repairs have been left undone for decades. Now the state has to
pay the cost to catch up and must improve transportation systems, roads
and bridges to protect the future of its economy, he said.
The governor gave a bleak assessment of the state’s transportation
system infrastructure and public skepticism over past transportation
funding problems. He said rail service is unreliable and inadequate,
local bus services around the state are chronically underfunded and the
condition of the roads is shocking.
Mr. Patrick acknowledged that mismanagement and cost overruns from the
Big Dig project and reports of pension abuses in transportation agencies
have shattered public confidence in the state’s transportation system.
“It’s time we leveled with each other and with the public about it, and
put it all, the neglect, the shortsightedness, the excesses and the
excuses to an end,” Mr. Patrick said while outlining a proposed makeover
of state transportation agencies and his hope to inject an additional
$600 million a year into transportation through the higher gasoline tax.
Asked if the gasoline tax hike would boost the cost of living and cost
of doing business and make the state less competitive, Mr. Patrick said
political decisions in the past to under-fund transportation
infrastructure have left the state in a situation where failure to raise
the gasoline tax now “will jeopardize our economic future” because the
system would deteriorate further.
The reform plan would abolish the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority and
have the road run by and tolls collected by the Massachusetts Highway
Department. The governor said he would also end the current
Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority retirement benefits that
allow pensioned retirements after 23 years on the job. Bureaucratic
consolidations would eliminate 300 jobs, according to the governor’s
office.
The governor said he will ask the Turnpike Authority board to give
conditional approval of the pending toll hikes next week, which include
toll increases at tollbooths on the Massachusetts Turnpike inside Route
128 and a doubling of Boston Harbor tunnel tolls to $7. That condition,
he said, would allow the rollback of those toll hikes if the state
Legislature approves the new funding plan.
In making his pitch for the gasoline tax hike, the governor said it
would only cost people the equivalent of one large cup of coffee each
week, or about $8 per month. If adopted as requested by the governor, it
would add $2.85 to a 15-gallon fill-up.
The plan, which will take the form of a bill to be submitted to the
Legislature in the coming weeks, also is expected to provide for state
ownership of Worcester Regional Airport, and a boost in spending for
regional transit authorities. It also would place the previously
independent MBTA under the state transportation secretary and give the
secretary a greater role in overseeing the Massachusetts Port Authority,
which would retain its independent board of directors.
House Speaker Robert E. DeLeo, D-Winthrop, called the proposals a good
beginning and said the House would act on the transportation proposals
and the gasoline tax increase before it takes up the state budget this
spring. The governor said if acted on quickly the gasoline taxes could
be put in place at the end of March.
Senate President Therese Murray, D-Plymouth, said the governor’s
proposals are similar to a transportation consolidation plan she
outlined last month. She said the Senate will hold public hearings on
the plan after Mr. Patrick files legislation.
The Boston Herald
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Gas tax, Pike hike add fuel to fire
By Howie Carr
Gov. Deval Patrick, what part of “no” do you not understand?
No to the 19-cent increase in the gas tax.
No to the obscene hike in the tolls.
I know, the highest state gas tax in America will merely cost the
“average” motorist “one large cup of coffee a week.” It’s the least we
can do for what Deval calls the infrastructure - the bloated T pensions,
the sticky-fingered Mass Pike tolltakers and Troop E’s detail-inflated,
six-figure salaries, not to mention the “prevailing wage” scam -
methadone-addled ditch diggers making $50 an hour.
How appropriate that Deval’s as-yet-unwritten legislation is called the
“Transportation and Economic Security Plan.”
Economic security, all right. For hacks and pinky-ring union thugs.
Like Wimpy in the old Popeye cartoons, Deval will gladly give you
“reform” tomorrow for a tax increase today. He leaked his
soak-the-motorists scam to his sycophants at the dying broadsheet Friday
morning, then delivered the speech on the Friday afternoon of a
school-vacation week. How much more do you need to know?
Still, you owe it to yourself to read the entire opus - preferably on an
empty stomach. Let’s get right to it: “Every time we hear another story
. . . about a state worker collecting one pension from the T while
earning another in state government, the average citizen gets madder.”
One of those double-dippers would be the son of Billy Bulger, he of the
$197,000-a-year state pension, with whom Deval met regularly at Mul’s
Diner on West Broadway during the 2006 campaign to concoct grand schemes
to beggar the working man. Another of those MBTA double-dippers is the
boss of the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority, Jim Rooney,
several of whose board members Deval appoints. Maybe I missed it, but
have any of Patrick’s MCCA appointees ever raised concerns about
Rooney’s rip-offs?
“Don’t perpetuate the Big Dig culture,” Deval intones.
Right . . . the one that provided sleazy Jim Aloisi, Deval’s new
transportation secretary, with millions in legal fees, not to mention
one of those tsarist pensions that make us “average citizens” get
madder.
“Let me be clear: the ‘23 years and out’ rule, where T employees start
receiving a pension earlier than any reasonable retirement, is coming to
an end.” Let me be clear: If you believe that whopper, you’re probably
still holding your breath waiting for that property tax relief that
candidate Patrick promised you in 2006.
Strangely, there wasn’t a single word in his speech about removing the
toll booths on the Pike, which were supposed to come down in 1987. He
does mention the “stiff imminent increases in tolls” that his Pike board
may be rubber-stamping soon. He’s quite worried about all of us from
“the North Shore, East Boston and MetroWest,” though not concerned
enough to order his tax-fatted hyenas who run the Pike to take that
extortionate option off the table.
Deval does promise to eliminate “about 300 positions,” no names
attached, and I predict neither of Rep. John Fresolo’s siblings will
have to be extracted from their Worcester toll booths with the Jaws of
Life.
How stupid does Patrick think we are? As long as the Pike toll booths
are up, we are all held hostage, like that rich businessman shaken down
by the “escort” from Canton who kept blackmailing him every time she ran
short on dough.
Don’t blame me, I voted for Muffy. For the rest of you guilt-ridden
sheeple, how’s this one-party rule thing working out for you?
The Boston Herald
Monday, February 23, 2009
A Boston Herald editorial
What lies beneath
Gov. Deval Patrick’s transportation reform proposal is dominated on the
surface by a 19 cents per gallon increase in the state gas tax, which is
troubling enough. Scratch that surface and the plan contains other ideas
to raise eyebrows.
Future gas tax hikes would be tied to inflation, for example, virtually
guaranteeing an annual increase. The inflation provision wasn’t adopted
the last time the gas tax went up, which Patrick blames for deepening
the financial hole the transportation system is in today.
We imagine it has quite a bit to do with years of mismanagement and
excessive spending on worker benefits, but why quibble over details.
Meanwhile, the bridge and tunnel toll discount for residents of some
neighborhoods would be scaled back. Vehicle registration would cost more
for cars that use more gas. And, it is worth noting again, the plan
would not eliminate Turnpike tolls west of Route 128 - as promised just
months ago.
Meanwhile Patrick wants to pursue the idea of charging drivers based on
the number of miles they drive, rather than how much gas they consume,
to plan for the future - to counteract the inevitable downturn in gas
tax receipts as more fuel efficient vehicles come on-line.
In this he has the support of new U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray
LaHood, who mused about the possibility during an interview last week.
He does not, apparently, have the support of the president. On Friday
the White House made clear LaHood had gone off the reservation and a
federal “miles traveled” idea won’t happen.
The gas tax increase is only part of the damaging equation.
The Boston Herald
Monday, February 23, 2009
Efficiency cut short
State gov’t just grows
By Eric Fehrnstrom
You might think with all the doomsday headlines about spending cuts, and
with a slew of proposed tax increases under consideration at the State
House, that Massachusetts has carved deeply into its budget. You would
be wrong. Even after all the “cuts” are factored in, state spending in
the current year is on track to increase by half a billion dollars.
Is now really the time to let new taxes fall on people struggling to
make ends meet?
No one needs 3-D glasses to see how taxing a person more in a downturn
makes matters worse. A higher level of taxation deprives individuals of
dollars, leading to depressed consumer spending and lower demand for
products and services. When government takes money out of a weakened
economy, it creates a doom loop that feeds on itself.
This is why President Obama backed off his campaign promise to seek
immediate repeal of the Bush tax cuts.
A succession of Republican governors going back to Bill Weld in 1990
understood this basic economic maxim. The way they honored it was with a
no-new-tax pledge. This was important in convincing the world that we
had shed the Dukakis-era label of “Taxachusetts.”
Sadly, the tough-on-taxes approach that helped fuel the state’s economy
has sputtered. Last year, it was higher taxes on cigarettes and on the
out-of-state profits of Massachusetts companies. This year, if Gov.
Deval Patrick has his way, it’s higher taxes on candy, gas, soft drinks,
beer, restaurant meals and hotel rooms. Cities and towns would be
allowed to tax utility poles, which would lead to higher electric and
phone rates, and have the option to raise taxes on hotels and
restaurants within their borders.
These are the spoils of one-party rule. In a state where every statewide
office, all 10 congressional seats, the two U.S. senators and 179 out of
200 legislators belong to the Democratic Party, there are few dissenters
to this reckless tax-and-spend course. A battered Republican minority
lacks the numbers to stop it.
While it’s fair to say that Patrick has cut growth in the rate of
spending, he has not cut spending. After this year’s $500 million
increase, from $27.2 billion to $27.7 billion, the “lean” budget for the
coming 2010 fiscal year is slated to go up another $200 million, to
$27.9 billion, according to projected financial statements.
Contrast that with Weld’s budget battles, when actual spending declined
from $13.6 billion in 1991 to $13.4 billion in 1992. In Mitt Romney’s
first year in office, he took spending down by $400 million, from $22.8
billion in 2002 to $22.4 billion in 2003. These periodic contractions
are rare but necessary in slowing the inexorable and unaffordable growth
in programs and payrolls.
Voter outrage is growing, but has been met with the same indifference
that Marie Antoinette showed for peasants. The “let them eat cake”
attitude has been updated for the modern palate by Patrick’s
Transportation Secretary Jim Aloisi. When the Pike imposed a $6 annual
maintenance fee on FastLane transponder users, Aloisi sniffed that it
cost roughly the same as “a turkey sandwich with a little side of pasta
salad.”
For such insensitivity, Antoinette lost her head. Let’s hope Bay Staters
are more forgiving, but only with respect to their methods.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Gov adds insult to injury
His attitude offends
By Michael Graham
Defending his plan to stick Massachusetts families with the highest
gasoline tax in America, Gov. Deval Patrick told CNN that he was merely
being “candid about our choices and none of them are pleasant.” Then,
Patrick put on his smug, “you’re not smart, you’re just pretending to
be” face and added:
“Grownups know that you can’t have something for nothing.”
Oh, really.
There is an odd virus infecting the body politic of late. Politicians,
once obsequious suck-ups to the electorate, have taken to insulting us
at every turn. Candidate Barack Obama famously said the American people
were “basically decent . . . but get confused sometimes. They listen to
the wrong talk radio.” And there was Obama’s off-the-record complaints
that Americans were bitter clingers to guns and religion.
Last week Attorney General Eric Holder called us “a nation of cowards”
when it comes to discussing matters of race. Obama has yet to contradict
him, while our own governor appeared on CNN to offer Holder his “Amen!”
It was during that CNN appearance that Patrick made his snarky remarks
about the immaturity of the Massachusetts electorate.
Most Bay Staters don’t want to pay 61 cents a gallon in gas taxes. And
it’s a safe bet that most of us don’t want a gas tax that goes up
automatically every year.
Because we disagree with him, Patrick implies that we are children,
lacking in an adult understanding of the world. “Grownups know” that
they must support Patrick’s massive $500 million tax increase in the
middle of a recession, while we children - cynical and dimwitted as well
- resist the governor’s plan.
But the governor’s got it backward. It requires a truly child-like faith
to believe that Deval and the Democrats can be trusted with half a
billion in new gas taxes today based on the promise of reform tomorrow.
Reform state government? He can’t even control Massport, where secret
votes raise parking fees and Big Dig contractors keep getting big money
contracts, all under the watchful eye of Patrick’s Grownup in Chief, Jim
Aloisi.
If there’s anyone in Massachusetts trying to get “something for
nothing,” it’s our governor himself.
The “something” is a lot more money. Gas taxes, a “Hummer” fee on
vehicle registrations, a beer tax, a candy tax, etc. And what will we
get in return? Nothing.
Are the tolls on the Turnpike going to be shut down? Will the 1,300 Pike
employees be forced to get real jobs? Will state workers get benefits in
line with the rest of us? Will we stop paying budget-busting “prevailing
wage” on government projects and let non-union contractors save us
taxpayers a few bucks?
No, no and hell no! Folks like me, with a daily commute from Metrowest,
will be paying $1,500 a year just in gas taxes and tolls so that the
same hacks can have the same jobs for yet another day. In fact, most of
the new gas tax doesn’t even go to roads. It goes to debt payments, the
MBTA and commuter rail.
We pay millions in new taxes to drive on the same, lousy pothole-riddled
roads, and if we complain about it, the governor insults us and calls us
children? Sure - because it’s easier to insult the electorate than to
take on the Beacon Hill establishment.
It’s a reminder of another childhood adage - that politicians, like
diapers, need to be changed often, and for the same reason.
State House News Service
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Toll hike vote endangers Patrick reform package,
say House members
By Jim O’Sullivan
Lawmakers said the Mass. Turnpike Authority’s approval Tuesday of $100
million in toll hikes imperiled Gov. Deval Patrick’s quest for a
transportation overhaul package that includes a 19 cent-per-gallon
increase to the 23.5-cent-per gallon gas tax, reduced personnel and
benefits in the transportation bureaucracy, and other new costs for
motorists.
The turnpike board voted 4-1 Tuesday to approve the toll hikes, which
board members said would be reversed if Beacon Hill can agree on a gas
tax increase and transportation reforms, no small feat. The package
calls for a two-tiered toll increase, the first stage taking effect
March 29, the second slated for July 1.
Under the first stage, cash tolls at the Allston-Brighton and Weston
tolls would hit $1.50, up a quarter, and the tunnel tolls would climb to
$5.50, up from $3.50. On July 1, unless the policies are repealed, tolls
would hit $2 at the booths and $7 at the two tunnels.
“What happens March 29 is anybody’s guess. If nothing changes,
obviously, the first phase of the toll increase will take effect,”
Aloisi told reporters after Tuesday’s contentious Pike board meeting.
“Hopefully we don’t have to reach that point.”
The Turnpike is carrying $2.2 billion in debt from the Big Dig project.
Patrick’s proposed gas tax hike, part of an effort to help the state dig
out of a funding deficit pegged close to $20 billion over 20 years just
to maintain infrastructure, would drive Massachusetts to a national high
in fuel levies. Without the toll hike, administration officials said,
the Pike’s bonds would be downgraded to junk status, driving up
borrowing costs and potentially endangering the Commonwealth’s own
strong credit rating.
“The people demand leadership,” Aloisi said. “The times require
leadership, and we’re providing leadership.”
Angry lawmakers from the Metrowest and North Shore areas said they had
not seen the motion on toll hikes prior to the board’s vote, and said
backing in the legislative branch for Patrick’s reform proposal would
erode.
“Secretary Aloisi’s done a very good job of losing that support,” said
Rep. David Linsky (D-Natick).
Patrick aides said at 5:30 pm that the bill had been filed. The motion,
which was not available to lawmakers or the press during or immediately
after the meeting, called for the board to report on operating
efficiencies within 90 days and to promptly “revise or rescind all or a
portion of the toll increases upon the Commonwealth enacting legislation
which provides dedicated alternative sources of revenue to the
Authority.”
The governor last Friday said he’d insist on passage of reforms and
revenues to reverse toll increases.
Tuesday’s Pike board meeting featured a series of testy exchanges
between Transportation Secretary James Aloisi, a Patrick appointee who
chairs the board, and Romney appointee and board member Mary Connaughton.
“Don’t point at me,” Aloisi said at one point.
After the meeting, Aloisi told Connaughton, “You better wake up.”
“You’re out-Matt Amorelloing Matt Amorello,” Connaughton said, referring
to the former state senator and turnpike chief who came under fire for
his oversight of the Big Dig and his management of turnpike affairs.
The toll hikes were approved despite strong opposition to the increases
voiced at a series of public hearings. While critics of the toll
increases say the government is foisting unaffordable new costs on
drivers, supporters say the new toll revenues are necessary to pay
turnpike bills, including debt service tied to the Big Dig project.
Patrick outlined planned legislation last Friday that features a
19-cent-per-gallon gas increase coupled with efficiency-minded
operational changes throughout the transportation bureaucracy.
Legislative leaders on Friday gave Patrick's ideas a relatively warm
welcome but on Monday night the chairmen of the Legislature's
Transportation Committee questioned support for the gas tax hike amongst
lawmakers.
Aloisi denied the agency was blackmailing the Legislature into approving
the gas tax, calling the plan comprehensive and calling for alternative
solutions.
“When Gov. Romney asked for a bill to be enacted into law when the
ceiling fell on a woman, it was done in one day,” Aloisi told reporters,
referring to the 2006 death of Milena del Valle when a ceiling tunnel
collapsed on the car in which she was riding. “We know how quickly the
Legislature can move. And, look, I consider the Legislature my
collaborators and my colleagues in this, not my adversaries.”
Linsky said he had been denied access to documents regarding the
agency’s imperiled credit rating. “They don’t exist,” Linsky said,
producing an email from executive director Alan LeBovidge that
referenced phone calls about the rating.
Lawmakers also flexed their committee muscles, Rep. Steven Walsh saying
that the Committee on State Administration and Regulatory Oversight he
co-chairs was likely to call for the Turnpike to open its finances to
lawmakers, and Rep. Linsky, newly appointed chair of the House Post
Audit Committee, said he had already threatened Pike officials with a
subpoena.
“I think in terms of process, it’s unfortunate that we were denied an
opportunity for public comment, which I specifically requested of the
secretary,” said Walsh (D-Lynn).
Walsh said he had also requested a larger room for the meeting, which
was squeezed into a State Transportation Building conference room that
left aides, reporters, and observers spilling into the hall and an
adjacent office.
Walsh said, “The secretary didn’t have an opportunity to participate in
the public hearings, so really didn’t get a flavor of what this would do
to the working families of the North Shore. This is really the North
Shore anti-recovery package. This is really a de-stimulus.”
Patrick, who during the 2006 campaign vowed a gas tax would not ensue
during his administration, has said he embraced the plan only
reluctantly.
“I’m certainly not joyful about proposing a gas tax increase,” Patrick
said early Tuesday morning during an appearance from Washington on
MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” show. “But it’s that or very steep increases in
turnpike tolls and very steep increases in mass transit fees and
reductions in services. We have been putting off these decisions for 16
years or more and the bill us due now and we have got to start leveling
with people about what our choices are asking people to make responsible
choices.”
Since the board gave the toll hike initial approval in November,
lawmakers, backed by former Speaker Salvatore DiMasi, generated momentum
behind a gas tax increase, provided it came either after or concurrently
with reform. Patrick, too, last week said new revenue demands needed to
be accompanied by reform. But lawmakers said the timing of the toll vote
put them on politically difficult terrain.
Aloisi and Connaughton squared off repeatedly, as Aloisi repeatedly
tried to cut her off while Connaughton outlined an amendment she tried
to offer proposing trimmed operating costs and a restored toll site in
West Newton.
“Please watch your language,” Aloisi warned at one point, after
Connaughton had suggested he desired toll hikes. “It’s not the tolls I
really want,” he said. Connaughton apologized.
After the meeting, Aloisi denied any personality conflict with
Connaughton, drawing audible laughter from the assembled press corps.
Patrick appointee Michael Angelini said higher tolls would still result
in a shortfall for capital investments.
“We are not doing anything more, by even one penny, than meeting the
minimum requirements,” Angelini said.
At least seven lawmakers attended the hearing, and met with reporters
outside the meeting. Sen. Karen Spilka (D-Ashland), a close ally of
Senate President Therese Murray, said she was “profoundly disappointed”
with the agency.
“It’s not a gun to our heads,” said Walsh. “It’s a gun to the heads of
the working families of the Metrowest and North Shore regions.”
“I think that those that don’t want to raise new revenues will see the
vote today as a reason not to take the vote,” Walsh said. “I think the
entire plan is in trouble today.”
Speaker Robert DeLeo, who has largely kept his powder dry as he finds
footing as the new House chief, opposes the toll boost, in part because
he represents Winthrop, where commuters to Boston must pay tolls.
“The speaker has been against the toll increase since the day it was
first announced,” said Walsh, one of a handful of House chairs
reappointed by DeLeo to their previous posts.
The meeting also featured Connaughton’s ouster from the board’s Audit
Committee. A Romney appointee and frequent voice of dissent on the
board, Connaughton said before the meeting that she had been marked for
removal from the panel, despite being the only certified public
accountant on the board.
“They’re doing this because, in my opinion, they don’t want the
transparency that I bring to the table,” Connaughton said.
A turnpike spokesman said Aloisi was “revolving seats” on the committee
“to ensure fairness and to let every board member have the opportunity
to serve on the Audit Committee.”
Connaughton will be replaced by Angelini, appointed by Patrick.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Pols turn on Gov. Deval Patrick over gas tax
Board votes to increase Turnpike tolls
By Hillary Chabot
Blasting Turnpike officials for misrepresenting reforms, several
lawmakers soured yesterday to Gov. Deval Patrick’s plan to increase the
gas tax by 19 cents after Pike board members voted to hike tolls.
Patrick pointed to $31 million in savings at the Massachusetts Turnpike
on Friday through staff and overtime cuts, but more than half of the
so-called reforms were simply expired contracts.
“I don’t know where they’re going to get the votes from,” said Sen. Mark
C. Montigny (D-New Bedford) of Patrick’s plan. “I wouldn’t even consider
a vote for the gas tax right now. I have so little faith that we’ll get
the dramatic reforms we need.”
Patrick, who lambasted the culture of “fiscal shell games” on Beacon
Hill when he campaigned for the Corner Office, highlighted the savings
last week as he unveiled a plan to raise the gas tax.
Most of the $21 million in contracts, many of which are connected to the
Big Dig, have expired, said Pike Executive Director Alan LeBovidge.
“My view is we’re cutting the costs. We demonstrated to the board that
we were able to cut our operating costs and now we need revenue,”
LeBovidge said, adding some contracts were canceled.
Turnpike board members approved a toll hike yesterday in a 4 to 1 vote
despite the governor’s plan, saying the increase was necessary to
prevent another blow to the agency’s credit rating.
The vote forces lawmakers to pass the gas tax by March 29 or Pike
drivers will face a $2 increase on the tunnels and a .25-cent boost at
the Allston and Weston tollbooths.
“What happens March 29 is anybody’s guess. If nothing changes,
obviously, the first phase of the toll increase will take effect,”
Transportation Secretary James Aloisi said. “Hopefully we don’t have to
reach that point.”
Tolls will go up again July 1 if the gas tax plan isn’t passed. Drivers
would be hit with a $7 charge at the Ted Williams and Sumner tunnels and
a $2 charge at the tollbooths.
The toll hike angered Rep. David Linsky (D-Framingham), who had
applauded Patrick’s gas tax plan last week.
“We cannot be asking for an increase in tolls or taxes before the
reforms are made,” Linsky said.
The Boston Globe
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Turnpike OK's toll increases, awaits decision on gas tax
By Noah Bierman
The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority approved a set of staggered toll
hikes yesterday that could be eliminated if the Legislature increases
the state gas tax.
The toll hikes could eventually cost commuters hundreds of dollars per
year. In the meantime, the complex plan is likely to baffle them.
Members of the Legislature, who had asked the authority to delay the
vote, were furious at the Patrick administration, which controls the
Turnpike Authority, for pushing the hikes through before filing a gas
tax bill that could have averted them.
"This nonsense is either politically naïve or political hardball," said
Representative Thomas P. Conroy, a Wayland Democrat. "If you raise the
tolls, people do not trust the board to rescind a toll hike."
The toll hike plan that passed 4 to 1 yesterday, forged amid months of
protests and public deliberations, comes in two steps. The first
increase takes effect March 29, bringing cash tolls to $1.50 at the
Allston-Brighton and Weston tolls and to $5.50 at the Ted Williams and
Sumner tunnels.
That's an increase of 25 cents at the turnpike booths inside Route 128
and $2 at the tunnels. Fast Lane users will continue to get a discount.
The second hike takes effect July 1, bringing cash tolls to $2 at the
booths inside Route 128 and $7 at the tunnels.
"Bad idea," said Jim Boyle, a Beverly resident who works in Boston.
"Make one plan. That's why things don't seem to get done the way they
should in this state."
Board members said both rounds of toll increases can be averted if the
Legislature increases the gas tax before they take effect. If the
Legislature raises the gas tax after tolls go up, the toll increases
will be rolled back, they promised.
"There's no confusion," said James A. Aloisi Jr., state transportation
secretary and chairman of the turnpike board. "We've been very clear
that we need to do this or we face financial disaster on the turnpike."
The unusual arrangement follows more than a year of public and private
concern over the Turnpike Authority's financial situation. Commuters
were outraged about earlier plans to raise $100 million more in tolls
all at once, forming protest organizations and showing up by the
hundreds to rallies and public hearings. Yesterday's vote prompted the
state Republican Party to plan a rally this morning in front of the
State House.
Governor Deval Patrick has promised repeatedly since late 2007 to
present a comprehensive transportation restructuring plan, but was
unable to do so in time to avoid Tuesday's vote.
Legislators have complained that Patrick's latest plan, announced last
week but not filed in the form of a bill until yesterday afternoon,
pressures them to act quickly on the gas tax to avoid the toll hike.
Aloisi was happy yesterday to turn up the pressure further, pointing out
that legislators had passed a bill in a single day after the Big Dig
tunnel ceiling collapsed in 2006 and asserting that Patrick's
transportation overhaul can be deliberated and passed before the toll
increases take effect.
But legislators, even those supportive of a higher gas tax, said they
would have trouble rallying support for Patrick's gas tax increase with
the toll hikes already passed.
"It crystallizes the issue of tolls versus gas tax, but there's a public
process that needs to take place," said Representative David P. Linsky,
a Natick Democrat.
Turnpike board members said they had no choice but to approve an
increase yesterday. They are concerned that the authority's slipping
credit rating will otherwise decline to junk bond status, risking
hundreds of millions in lump-sum payments owed to pay off risky and
complex investments and jeopardizing other state agencies' ability to
borrow.
The first hike is meant to get the authority through the end of its
current budget year, by raising $12.8 million to plug an $8.1 million
budget gap. The second phase of the toll increase would raise $100
million a year, divided mostly between debt payments and structural
upgrades to roads and bridges that have been falling apart.
Without a gas tax or some other source of money, the authority predicts
another toll increase on or near July 2014, when debt payments - mostly
from the Big Dig - balloon.
Whether or not the first toll increase takes effect, the heavily
indebted Turnpike Authority will immediately begin spending thousands of
dollars preparing for a new toll rate.
Alan LeBovidge, executive director, said he does not know the full cost
of the change, but guesses it will cost $25,000 to $50,000 each time a
new rate is set.
The biggest cost is reprogramming computer software for electronic toll
collections, which will begin immediately, he said. The authority will
not replace signs for what may be only temporary prices; they'll put new
covers on the old ones, he said.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
A Boston Herald editorial
Pike strikes unfair deal
When it comes to taxes and tolls Bay State drivers and Beacon Hill
lawmakers are being offered a false choice.
Yes, the Patrick administration has taken the next step on its long and
winding path to transportation “reform” by going ahead with a vote to
raise tolls on the Massachusetts Turnpike, but promising to repeal them
as soon as the Legislature passes a punitive gas tax increase.
Gov. Deval Patrick, of course, has been quite vocal in his pledge to
tolerate either a gas tax increase or a toll hike - but not both. But it
seems that promise only goes so far.
Indeed, the toll increases are scheduled to take effect on March 29 and
again on July 1, unless the Legislature acts. But a close read of the
measure voted on yesterday by the Pike board reveals a loophole as wide
as a Turnpike tollbooth.
The measure reads, in part:
“The Board shall take appropriate and prompt action prior to these
effective dates to revise or rescind all or a portion of the toll
increases upon the Commonwealth enacting legislation which provides
dedicated alternative sources of revenue to the Authority.”
In other words, if lawmakers approve a gas tax hike that is less than
the 19 cents Patrick has demanded (but that still covers the Pike’s debt
problems) the board may repeal only “a portion” of the toll hike. And in
this case we can only imagine what “revise” means.
Lawmakers are right to think twice before they give in to the
administration’s unreasonable demands.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Pin the stickup at the tolls on Deval Patrick
By Howie Carr
Deval Patrick did it. He raised your tolls yesterday.
It wasn’t the earlier Republican governors. It wasn’t the 90 percent
Democrat Legislature. It was Deval Patrick, the forked-tongue politician
who in 2006 promised to cut your property taxes for you, and, I hate to
repeat myself, but how’s that one working out for you?
Now the tolls at Allston and at Route 128 go up a quarter to $1.50 on
March 29 and then to two bucks on July 1, unless of course the
tax-crazed Deval gets the 19-cent increase in the gas tax, in which
case, maybe his hacks will cut us some slack. Maybe.
Come July 1, it’ll be an $8 round trip into Boston from the west. And
the one-way tunnel tolls will rise from $3.50 to $5.50 on March 29 and
then to $7.00 on July 1.
Five members make up the Turnpike board that approved this fiasco
yesterday afternoon. Three of them were appointed by Gov.
I’m-Going-to-Cut-Your-Property-Taxes.
Here are the three statesmen who voted, along with a rich housewife from
Weston appointed by Mitt Romney, to beggar the taxpayers: Mike Angelini,
John Jenkins (of Natick, I like to add) and Jim Aloisi.
All three of them appointed by Gov. Deval Patrick.
I have considered all the options, Deval said Friday, in mock sadness. I
have considered the commuters from the North Shore, East Boston and
Metro West who are facing stiff imminent increases in tolls.
He considered us. And then his appointees voted to rob us, yet again, at
the tollbooths that were supposed to come down in 1987. Deval now holds
us hostage to get himself the highest gas tax in America, and then he
promises to rescind the tolls. I predict we end up like most hostages -
dead.
How can you ask motorists to pay this, asked dissident Pike board member
Mary Connaughton, when you still have state troopers making $240,000
with all those details, and you still have toll takers making $98,000 a
year with overtime?
Saturday afternoon, I flew into Logan Airport and got onto the Pike. At
the 128 exit in Weston, the hacks only had one tollbooth open. I noticed
two hack toll takers inside.
Just make sure, one of them said, that you know what a 10-dollar bill
looks like.
I thought that’s why they all had to go to toll-taker school - to learn
what a sawbuck looks like. I guess you don’t learn that until graduate
school for toll takers. I know what a $10 bill looks like, and starting
March 29, I see it waving goodbye to me every time I drive into Boston.
Thanks Deval!
The Salem News
Friday, February 20, 2009
Majority party not interested in 'sharing the pain'
By Rep. Brad Hill
I am writing to bring to attention to the citizens of the commonwealth
the irresponsible manner in which its state government is responding to
this recession. As you may know, the commonwealth's budget is currently
more than $2 billion short of revenues that were expected as early as
last July 1.
Many financial analysts and think-tanks reported that the budget passed
for fiscal year '09 was unsustainable. Despite those warnings, the
majority party's leadership went ahead and passed a budget that
ultimately was out of balance to the tune of $2.4 billion.
It was clear, within three months of the budget being signed into law,
that the governor needed to take further action to bring the bloated
budget into balance as mandated by the Constitution. Therefore, Gov.
Deval Patrick had to make mid-year cuts totaling $624 million. In
addition, among other monies found in minor accounts, the governor had
to take $200 million from the state's stabilization fund, further
jeopardizing our bond rating.
Three months later it was clear the economic storm experienced
throughout the country was going to continue to ravage our state budget.
Toward that end some other proposals to close an additional $1.1 billion
shortfall were proposed by the governor. These ideas should be troubling
to those many citizens who are finding it impossible to make ends meet.
Instead of additional cuts to state government, the governor has instead
suggested we fill the financial gap with increased taxation, increased
fees, cuts to local aid, additional raiding of the stabilization fund
and taking monies from the anticipated federal stimulus package. At no
point was there consideration to cut government spending.
Let me explain in detail some of the proposals that have been sent to
the Legislature by the governor. First, the governor has cut both the
Lottery and additional assistance accounts, which go to our cities and
towns, by a total of $128 million for this current year. Furthermore,
the governor will cut local aid by $375 million for next fiscal year, in
essence crippling many cities and towns across the commonwealth who have
seen similar drops in their own revenues. Local aid is the area where
most people see their tax money come back to them in services they
actually use, and should be cut only as a last resort.
While these cuts add to the commonwealth's bottom line, it won't add to
taxpayers' bottom line. We will end up paying for the shortfall at the
local level and experience devastating cuts in the services we all use
in our daily lives.
Second, the governor proposes a host of additional taxes and fees he
hopes will cover a structural deficit that has been created by
government spending at an unsustainable rate.
For example, he proposes a sales tax on candy, soda and alcohol for
which he hopes to generate $25 million for the current fiscal year and
as much as $150 million for next fiscal year. Especially for those of us
who represent communities within close proximity to other states, all we
will see is decreased tax revenues and more small businesses closing. We
have already seen this year that tax increases for retail products have
been insufficient in covering the budget deficit. With so many companies
and retail operations struggling, raising retail taxes to cover any
shortfalls is the last thing we should be thinking about. The only ones
making out are the businesses in surrounding states.
In addition to these proposed taxes, the governor wants to increase
Registry of Motor Vehicle fees. If past history is any indication, these
increased taxes and fees won't go away in better times. State government
will get used to it and find ways to spend it.
As we all know, many individuals are struggling due to high costs,
unemployment, reduced incomes and decimated values in investment
savings. This is no time to nickel-and-dime our citizens. Rather, these
economic times call for across-the-board reform and waste cutting as the
first course of action in balancing the budget.
As you may have heard in recent news media reports, our pension system
is in dire need of reform. State employees take pensions for their three
highest-earning years rather than their total average salary.
Outrageously, they only have to put in one working day to qualify as a
year of service! This system needs to be reformed now.
Can you imagine that we have two separate highway agencies within our
border? We need to initiate transportation reform and merge the two
systems in a way that stops the duplication of costs and services.
I continue to have a problem spending more than $3 million to pay public
employees to volunteer at nonprofit entities. Yet we do. Don't get me
wrong — I deeply believe in the charity of volunteer work, but for most
people outside the state bureaucracy, volunteering doesn't come with a
paycheck. Why the dictionary definition of volunteering doesn't apply to
state employees is beyond me; it's a sign that your state government is
not serious about tightening its belt.
We knew that lean times were coming, yet that didn't stop Gov. Patrick
from increasing the state's workforce by more than 2,000 people, with
additional hires being proposed in his fiscal year 2010 budget. This is
just the beginning of a list of governmental growth that we cannot
simply sustain.
Let me be clear: We cannot tax-and-spend ourselves out of a recession.
Government will just continue to exacerbate the problem. State
government needs to realize that when it uses the term "revenues," it is
your earnings they are talking about, not theirs. State revenues are
money coming out of your pocket, out of your hard work. When there is a
decrease in expected revenues, it means people are having trouble paying
their bills.
It is astounding that instead of using this economic crisis as an
opportunity to reform government, the majority party will continue to
feed state government's appetite for growth while simultaneously
increasing the burden on taxpayers' shoulders. They will try to sell
this irrational behavior as "sharing the pain" (and keep in mind that
many of these politicians accepted pay raises).
This arrogance of governmental power should be unacceptable to all the
taxpayers of Massachusetts.
Brad Hill, R-Ipswich, is the minority whip in the state House of
Representatives.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Angry citizens open fire on pols
By Edward Mason
From the bullet that smashed through a Lawrence City Hall window to
stinking fishes flung at the Gloucester mayor’s home, city and state
leaders are feeling the heat on the street from taxpayers and public
sector workers fuming over impending layoffs and service cuts.
Authorities believe a bullet that slammed into the Lawrence city
planner’s desk last weekend may be related the recent layoffs of 11 city
employees and the firing of two others.
“If someone is giving a message that you’d better watch out, that’s
disconcerting,” Lawrence Mayor Michael J. Sullivan told the Herald
yesterday.
Gloucester Mayor Carolyn Kirk, who receives plainclothes police
protection on occasion, found a pile of fish on her front porch last
month, and her secretary intercepts an almost daily stream of angry
e-mails and letters, redirecting the most menacing to police.
“In this budget climate, we’re all faced with cutting jobs, people’s
livelihoods,” Kirk said. “It makes a mayor a target.”
Meanwhile, at a gas station on Old Colony Avenue yesterday, State Rep.
Brian Wallace (D-South Boston) got an earful from a man incensed about
Gov. Deval Patrick’s proposed 19-cent gas tax hike.
“It’s gotten worse,” said Wallace, who also gets blistering e-mails from
constituents. “It’s taken a different tone, an edge. People are
stretched to the limit.”
Geoff Beckwith, executive director of the Massachusetts Municipal
Association, fears that the anger could morph into violence as the
economic crisis deepens.
“Unfortunately, the decisions local officials have to make are personal
ones, and people get upset at them,” Beckwith said. “When emotions run
high and difficult decisions are made, there’s the potential for
violence.”
Lynn Mayor Edward “Chip” Clancy agreed. “Any time you tell someone no,
people get very, very angry,” he explained.
Beckwith and other municipal officials are aware this latest onslaught
comes little more than a year after a disturbed gunman opened fire on
the Kirkwood, Mo., City Council, killing five people.
“We know we’re the people who feel the heat,” said Brockton Mayor James
Harrington, who’s considering laying off at least 100 cops and
firefighters. “That’s the job we chose, and it’s a big part of the job.”
In Melrose, Mayor Robert Dolan blamed tough times for a spike in
dime-dropping by anonymous tipsters targeting police, fire and public
works employees believed to be cavorting about on city time.
Lynn’s Clancy said he’s steering clear of bars and other places where he
might run into angry taxpayers.
“When they have a few in them,” Clancy said, “they get a little - how do
you say - demonstrative.”
NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this
material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior
interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes
only. For more information go to:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
|
