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CLT UPDATE
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
Beacon Hill is waking up, to
more taxes of course
|
Just when you thought it was safe to drive
on our roads, Bacon Hill is at it again.
Bless their hearts. They want more money out
of our wallets just after voting themselves big fat pay
raises. For some inexplicable reason, our elected leaders
think that Massachusetts drivers are the golden goose of
never-ending tax dollars.
Rep. Brian Murray (D-Milford) is filing
legislation to enact electronic tolling on roads across the
state: “The bill would seek to direct the Registry of Motor
Vehicles to install electronic gantry tolling systems on
roadways other than the Massachusetts Turnpike, such as
Route 3, 93, 128 at such rates that the registry may
determine.”
If this bill is passed, the Registry would
be empowered to toll us on every state road. With Charlie
Baker as governor, you probably are not too worried about
this legislation. However, what happens when a Democrat wins
the Corner Office? At that point it would be akin to letting
the fox into the henhouse.
But hey, it’s for the roads....
The problem with Massachusetts roadways is
not lack of tax dollars being collected. It’s the spending.
The 2016 Reason Foundation’s report on state
highway systems shows how exorbitantly the commonwealth
spends on roadways. According to the data, Massachusetts
spend $74,000 on administrative costs per mile. We are
third-highest in the nation and seven times the national
average.
Overall, our state spends $675,000 per mile
per year on road maintenance. Only Florida and New Jersey
spend more than us. The average spending across the country
is $161,000 per mile! That means our roads cost four times
the national average. They are not four times the quality of
our New Hampshire neighbors, who expend $186,000 per mile.
The Boston Herald
Monday, April 3, 2017
Driven to anger over proposal for statewide tolls
By Holly Robichaud
A Massachusetts lawmaker has proposed a bill
that would enact tolls on major highways like Interstate 93,
Route 128 and Route 3.
State Rep. Brian Murray, a Democrat from
Milford, filed legislation in January seeking to install
electronic tolling systems on other major roadways.
Murray said that the bill was only meant as
a way to start a discussion. He said it's not fair that the
Massachusetts Turnpike is the state's only toll road,
forcing drivers in the central and western part of the state
to subsidize state highways....
Massachusetts drivers have mixed opinions on
Murray's proposal....
Chip Faulkner with advocacy group
Citizens for Limited Taxation says the bill won’t pass.
"Whether you call them tolls, taxes,
whatever, it is just a scheme for more revenue for the state
which is already overspending anyway," Faulker said.
NBC Boston
Monday, April 3, 2017
Should Massachusetts Have Tolls on I-93, Route 128 and Route
3?
— Click graphic above to watch
—
Acknowledging just how controversial of a
proposal it would be, Senate President Stanley Rosenberg on
Wednesday said Massachusetts should discuss imposing a tax
on services....
Among the reasons the state's solid economic
performance -- boasting a 3.4 percent unemployment rate and
the highest business confidence level in almost 13 years --
is not translating into sufficient revenue, Rosenberg said,
is that Massachusetts has "a sales tax that applies to
goods, not services, in an economy that's largely driven by
services."
Asked after his speech if he was proposing
that Massachusetts begin taxing services, Rosenberg said,
"We should certainly have a discussion about it."
"As you may remember, we had a service tax
in Massachusetts and it didn't last long," he said, alluding
to a state sales tax on business and professional services
that was passed in late 1990 in the waning days of the
Dukakis administration but repealed by the incoming Weld
administration before it ever took effect. "So it's very
controversial, but our economy is even more reliant now than
it was then on services and it is certainly worth looking
at."
The state's last attempt at establishing a
sales tax on services was the Legislature's short-lived 2013
law subjecting certain computer services to the sales tax.
Lawmakers wound up repealing their so-called tech tax amid
an outcry from businesses.
Though the Republican has taken a dim view
of new taxes, Gov. Charlie Baker has refused to take a
non-new-taxes pledge, saying in 2014 that he did not want to
be boxed into a position should a proposal arise to simplify
the tax code....
While he had the attention of the region's
business leaders, Rosenberg on Wednesday used that
opportunity to implore the business community not to pursue
a cut in the state sales tax on the 2018 ballot, arguing
that it would further compromise the state's fiscal health.
Rosenberg again pushed for the proposed 4
percent income surtax but warned a sales tax cut would
negate the revenue from the extra tax on higher earners....
In his prepared remarks, Rosenberg called
the proposed sales tax cut "a very bad idea" although he did
not use those words in his speech. Speaker DeLeo has said he
cannot see himself supporting a sales tax cut as it would
put Massachusetts "in a more precarious financial
situation."
State House News Service
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
Tax overhaul should include consideration of service tax,
Rosenberg says
House members will have until 5 p.m. next
Thursday, April 13, to file amendments to the fiscal 2018
spending proposal expected to be released by the House Ways
and Means Committee on Monday morning.
During its session Wednesday, the House
adopted an order (H 3599) establishing the procedures for
its annual budget debate, expected to be held the week of
April 24. The order forbids any amendments that would alter
the marijuana law approved by voters last November and bars
any "proposition on a subject different from the amendment
under consideration" from being considered as a further
amendment....
The House rejected an amendment offered by
Rep. Kevin Kuros which would have prohibited the House from
including more than one consolidated amendment -- a bundle
of amendments on the same topic compiled into one document
-- in a vote.
"In prior years we've ended up with 15
subject areas of amendments, for example constitutional
officers and state administration, local aid, elder affairs,
et cetera," he said. He added, "We're going to pass a $41
billion budget with 15 votes, I'm not sure I see a need to
consolidate that down to nine votes."
House members in recent years have dodged
tough political votes by dispensing with amendments behind
closed doors in favor of passing large consolidated
amendments and, in some cases, reducing the number of
recorded votes members must take by combining more than one
consolidated amendment.
State House News Service
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
House budget will again turn on mega-amendments
A retired community college president’s
staggering $334,000 golden parachute is breathing new life
into calls to rein in the generous payouts, where reforms to
date — including caps on vacation-time buyouts — have fallen
short of the mark, lawmakers warn.
“It’s mind-blowing,” said state Sen. Ryan
Fattman, a Webster Republican. “There has to be something
that can be done legislatively and I think these are the
types of stories that give those efforts a lot of traction.
This is something my staff and I have been talking a lot
about....
Combined with $68,079 in unused vacation
time, Asquino stands to rake in even more than the $269,984
former Bridgewater State University President Dana
Mohler-Faria got in 2015, then considered the largest payout
from the last decade.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, April 1, 2017
Retiring community college president payout sparks call for
new cap rules
With each eye-popping payout to a retiring
state employee the powers-that-be make an attempt to limit
future damage. But the new rules never seem to apply broadly
enough. That ought to change.
As the Herald reported Saturday, Daniel
Asquino walked away from the presidency of Mount Wachusett
Community College with an extra $334,000 — most of which he
is owed simply for not getting sick very often.
Asquino’s 1,250 days of unused sick time,
accrued over a three-decade career at the head of the school
(47 years in public higher ed) is being converted into
$266,000 in cash, while the remainder of the payout comes
from unused vacation time.
“Wait!” you might be thinking. “I thought
they fixed that.”
Well, kinda/sorta....
But even with the new limits in place,
Asquino’s longevity on the public payroll — and his
apparently extraordinary health — still entitle him to perks
enjoyed by very few people in the public or private
sectors. And while it is legal, it is far too generous.
Gov. Charlie Baker has included in his
budget plan for next year a measure to cap unused sick time
at 1,000 hours for state employees who work in the executive
branch, which ought to be the starting point (lawmakers
refused to act on the same proposal last year). House
minority leader Brad Jones (R-North Reading) is backing a
bill that would include public college employees, too —
arguing the need to be “as expansive as possible.”
By all means, be expansive. Taxpayers can no
longer afford to subsidize the lavish retirement dreams of
college administrators who work in the cushiest corner of
state government.
A Boston Herald editorial
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
A dose of reform
|
|
Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
More, more, more — always more
from us. More Is Never Enough (MINE), and never
will be, ever. Too many legislators have too much time
on their hands to sit around and scheme how to extract more
from us.Expansion of electronic tolling is next.
Electronic tolling was always coming, was sold on saving
money and offering convenience, but it has always been seen
as a means to rake in more, more, always more.
Never mind the invasion of privacy that Big Brother
Electronic Tolling imposes —
tracking every move of every vehicle every moment it's
moving — it's just so much
easier to raise revenue when you can simply click a few
computer keys on a whim and hope nobody notices.
And even worse, in the bill recently filed by freshman
state Rep. Brian Murray (D-Milford) he would give that
revenue-raising power entirely to the Registry of Motor
Vehicles to tap those computer keys and determine the toll
charges. If it were ever adopted there would be no
accountability or blame on legislators
— no fingerprints or forensics tying them to the "RMV"
crime scene.
Bear in mind that
Rep. Murray, most recently an attorney and Milford
selectman, was elected in November, first sworn in as a
state representative on January 4. He cast his first
important vote — to jack up
legislative pay — only a couple
of weeks later. Now he wants to jack up the cost of
driving. Rep. Murray has been a very busy freshman.
He'll fit right in up there at the Bacon Hill trough.
You may recall the recent "VMT" tax
— the Legislature's Vehicle-Miles-Traveled tax pilot
program which
Governor Baker vetoed last August (while the Legislature
was off on its five-month taxpayer-paid vacation), at the
same time the first electronic tolling "gantries" were being
erected over the Mass. Pike.
Expansion of electronic tolling has always been the
target since its introduction. Back on February 27,
2013 — four years ago under
Gov. Patrick — the State House
News Service reported ("Davey: Technology would open more
Mass. roads to tolls," by Andy Metzger):
Open-road tolling is an inexpensive prospect for the
Massachusetts Department of Transportation to put in
place, but the ease with which it can be implemented
could spell more tolls for drivers outside the
Interstate 90 corridor, according to Transportation
Secretary Richard Davey.
"While it might not happen in my time," Davey told
lawmakers Wednesday, the launch of open-road tolling
- which requires no tollbooths or toll collectors -
in Massachusetts will "set the table" for potential
tolling on new roads.
"All electronic tolling we really think holds out a
promise. And we mentioned this in our plan,
potentially for future tolling in and around the
state...."
Then three years later, on March 1, 2016, the SHNS
reported ("Traffic, tolling technology coming to Bay State
roads," by Colin A. Young):
Massachusetts drivers can expect to see a lot more
technology on the roads later this year when the
Department of Transportation begins to roll out its
all-electronic tolling program and a new real-time
traffic management system....
After [Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack's]
testimony Tuesday, Sen. Thomas McGee of Lynn asked
her about the potential to impose tolls on other
roads in the state to generate additional revenue
for transportation initiatives, citing a 2013
MassDOT report to the Legislature that detailed
scenarios for the expansion of tolling.
"What opportunities do we have in terms of tolling
other roads, recognizing that there's a substantial
amount of dollars that could be brought in in a fair
and reasonable way," McGee said. "I think that's an
important discussion ... I think (the federal
government is) starting to look at giving us more
tools to toll some of the interstates and we want to
know that so we at least can make an informed on
whether or not we should go in that direction."
Pollack said MassDOT is focused on making open-road
tolling on the Turnpike work for drivers and said
the expansion of tolling would be "a bigger
conversation" and "broader public policy question"
best saved for another day.
Still not enough. Now Senate President Stan
Rosenberg is promoting the expansion of the sales tax to
encompass business services, again, as well as having
another go at a graduated income tax —
their so-called "millionaire's tax" or "tax fairness
amendment." All this "revenue enhancement" and don't
anyone dare even mention a ballot question to roll back the
sales tax increase of 2009. The Legislature TAKES.
It never GIVES BACK.
Though he remembers history, when it comes to taking more
from us in taxes nothing is learned or seen as "settled
law." (Think of Proposition 2½
overrides that fail, then come right back: what we
call over-and-overrides.) Sen. Rosenberg recalled:
"As
you may remember, we had a service tax in
Massachusetts and it didn't last long," he said,
alluding to a state sales tax on business and
professional services that was passed in late 1990
in the waning days of the Dukakis administration but
repealed by the incoming Weld administration before
it ever took effect. "So it's very controversial,
but our economy is even more reliant now than it was
then on services and it is certainly worth looking
at."
The State House News Services recalls:
The
state's last attempt at establishing a sales tax on
services was the Legislature's short-lived 2013 law
subjecting certain computer services to the sales
tax. Lawmakers wound up repealing their so-called
tech tax amid an outcry from businesses.
Obviously, legislators didn't think that one through enough
either.
Then we are once again treated to another,
never-ending "eye-popping
payout to a retiring state employee." Somehow these
outrages never get fixed, keep popping up like
whack-a-mole. With this sort of need for revenue is it
any wonder why More Is Never Enough?
This Saturday, April 8th, will mark one year since CLT's
leader for over three decades, taxpayer champion Barbara
Anderson, passed away. It's been a tough year for
us without her; and I've had to pick up and do her job while
continuing to do my own, but my promise to keep CLT going
after she left us is being kept. So far, I've kept all
the promises I made to her and I've just kept another.
At the very close of
Barbara's final Salem News column, prepared in
advance and published posthumously on April 11th, she left
us with her dying wish:
". . . if anyone wants to honor my memory, please
remind Gov. Charlie Baker that when he was running
for office, he promised my friend Gerald Amirault
and his family that getting Gerald off parole and
his ankle bracelet would be a first order of
business. So far he has broken his promise,
and keeping it is my dying wish."
Nothing has happened in the year that has followed, but
silence, so today I mailed a note to Governor Baker at his
home reminding him of his promise and including a copy of
her final column. I'll let you know if we hear back
from him, or if there is just more silence and inaction.
|
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Chip Ford
Executive Director |
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The Boston Herald
Monday, April 3, 2017
Driven to anger over proposal for statewide
tolls
By Holly Robichaud
Just when you thought it was safe to drive on
our roads, Bacon Hill is at it again.
Bless their hearts. They want more money out of
our wallets just after voting themselves big fat
pay raises. For some inexplicable reason, our
elected leaders think that Massachusetts drivers
are the golden goose of never-ending tax
dollars.
Rep. Brian Murray (D-Milford) is filing
legislation to enact electronic tolling on roads
across the state: “The bill would seek to direct
the Registry of Motor Vehicles to install
electronic gantry tolling systems on roadways
other than the Massachusetts Turnpike, such as
Route 3, 93, 128 at such rates that the registry
may determine.”
If this bill is passed, the Registry would be
empowered to toll us on every state road. With
Charlie Baker as governor, you probably are not
too worried about this legislation. However,
what happens when a Democrat wins the Corner
Office? At that point it would be akin to
letting the fox into the henhouse.
But hey, it’s for the roads.
Lost is the fact that our toll roads were
supposed to be temporary. We are also supposed
to forget that the gas tax increased 3 cents per
gallon three years ago. While we repealed the
linkage of the gas tax to inflation at the
ballot box, the 3 cent hike was left in place.
Hence, Bacon Hill is getting more money from
drivers.
The problem with Massachusetts roadways is not
lack of tax dollars being collected. It’s the
spending.
The 2016 Reason Foundation’s report on state
highway systems shows how exorbitantly the
commonwealth spends on roadways. According to
the data, Massachusetts spend $74,000 on
administrative costs per mile. We are
third-highest in the nation and seven times the
national average.
Overall, our state spends $675,000 per mile per
year on road maintenance. Only Florida and New
Jersey spend more than us. The average spending
across the country is $161,000 per mile! That
means our roads cost four times the national
average. They are not four times the quality of
our New Hampshire neighbors, who expend $186,000
per mile.
As someone who regularly drives the
Massachusetts Turnpike, Murray is probably
frustrated with paying the tolls. However,
opening the door to open road tolling across the
commonwealth is not the answer. It would be to
end the tolls on the Pike and cut costs.
By filing this legislation, Murray is endorsing
spending more than $675,000 per mile! Please
call your legislators and ask them to oppose HD
1830.
NBC Boston
Monday, April 3, 2017
Should Massachusetts Have Tolls on I-93, Route
128 and Route 3?
By Jonathan Choe and Marc Fortier
A Massachusetts lawmaker has proposed a bill
that would enact tolls on major highways like
Interstate 93, Route 128 and Route 3.
State Rep. Brian Murray, a Democrat from
Milford, filed legislation in January seeking to
install electronic tolling systems on other
major roadways.
Murray said that the bill was only meant as a
way to start a discussion. He said it's not fair
that the Massachusetts Turnpike is the state's
only toll road, forcing drivers in the central
and western part of the state to subsidize state
highways.
"So not just the western Mass. drivers and the
central Mass. drivers are footing the bill for
the bulk of the transportation costs," Murray
explained.
Massachusetts drivers have mixed opinions on
Murray's proposal. Joseph Harfoush, a livery
driver, says the current tolls are really
starting to add up on the Mass Turnpike.
"What happened to the discussion they wanted to
take the tolls away," Harfoush asked.
He said dealing with even more tolls on other
state highways would dip into his profits.
"If it essentially makes the costs about the
same to use all the highways and they are just
redistributing it, then that sounds like a
pretty good plan to me,” said driver Jessica
Brady.
Chip Faulkner with advocacy group Citizens
for Limited Taxation says the bill won’t
pass.
"Whether you call them tolls, taxes, whatever,
it is just a scheme for more revenue for the
state which is already overspending anyway,"
Faulker said.
Murray admits there are still some roadblocks
and that his proposal is still in the early
phase. He also says he is open to more input
before it goes to the transportation committee.
State House News Service
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
Tax overhaul should include consideration of
service tax, Rosenberg says
By Colin A. Young
Acknowledging just how controversial of a
proposal it would be, Senate President Stanley
Rosenberg on Wednesday said Massachusetts should
discuss imposing a tax on services.
Speaking over the din of clinking coffee cups
and silverware at a Greater Boston Chamber of
Commerce breakfast in Boston's seaport,
Rosenberg said the state's tax structure is not
working -- pointing to tax revenues that have
fallen short of projections in recent years as
evidence that the state's tax code is not
bringing in enough revenue to support state
spending.
"It has been many years since we've been able to
balance our budget without resorting to gimmicks
and one-time revenue fixes -- Band-aids that
result in structurally imbalanced budgets the
following years," he said. "In effect, we've
been propping up a sagging house without ever
addressing the real problem -- its shaky
foundation."
Among the reasons the state's solid economic
performance -- boasting a 3.4 percent
unemployment rate and the highest business
confidence level in almost 13 years -- is not
translating into sufficient revenue, Rosenberg
said, is that Massachusetts has "a sales tax
that applies to goods, not services, in an
economy that's largely driven by services."
Asked after his speech if he was proposing that
Massachusetts begin taxing services, Rosenberg
said, "We should certainly have a discussion
about it."
"As you may remember, we had a service tax in
Massachusetts and it didn't last long," he said,
alluding to a state sales tax on business and
professional services that was passed in late
1990 in the waning days of the Dukakis
administration but repealed by the incoming Weld
administration before it ever took effect. "So
it's very controversial, but our economy is even
more reliant now than it was then on services
and it is certainly worth looking at."
The state's last attempt at establishing a sales
tax on services was the Legislature's
short-lived 2013 law subjecting certain computer
services to the sales tax. Lawmakers wound up
repealing their so-called tech tax amid an
outcry from businesses.
Though the Republican has taken a dim view of
new taxes, Gov. Charlie Baker has refused to
take a non-new-taxes pledge, saying in 2014 that
he did not want to be boxed into a position
should a proposal arise to simplify the tax
code. And in House Speaker Robert DeLeo, a
Democrat and author of the 2009 sales tax rate
hike to 6.25 percent, Baker for at least the
first half of his term has found an ally in
resisting higher tax proposals.
Rosenberg, who noted in his speech Wednesday
that he was one of six lawmakers to sign a
conference committee report authorizing the
largest tax cut in state history, said the state
was "short on cash" and should look at altering
the rest of its "regressive tax structure."
"We should sit down and take a look at our
property tax, our sales tax, our income tax and
figure out what makes sense, our corporate tax,"
he told reporters after his remarks.
But to do so through the legislative process,
the more conservative House would have to be the
genesis of any such legislation because bills
that raise revenue, so-called money bills, can
only originate in the House.
"But anybody can make a proposal," noted
Rosenberg, who mentioned in his speech that
Baker had proposed a tax on short-term rentals
and a new assessment on certain employers to
help the state meet its health care cost
obligations.
He said he is not aware of any current proposals
to establish a sales tax on services and said he
would "assume" that any action towards a service
tax would begin after the 2018 election, when a
proposed 4 percent surtax on income above $1
million is expected to go to voters.
While he had the attention of the region's
business leaders, Rosenberg on Wednesday used
that opportunity to implore the business
community not to pursue a cut in the state sales
tax on the 2018 ballot, arguing that it would
further compromise the state's fiscal health.
Rosenberg again pushed for the proposed 4
percent income surtax but warned a sales tax cut
would negate the revenue from the extra tax on
higher earners.
"If the fair share tax passed and the sales tax
[cut] passed, we'd lose about the same amount of
revenue we'd gain and all the revenue we'd gain
will be earmarked for education and
transportation," he said. "And we'd lose all
that other money that's being used to fund other
projects in the budget at this point, which as I
described, is out of structural balance."
Frustrated by the rising share of tax-free sales
transacted online, retailers last month said
they are considering the launch of a ballot
campaign in 2018 to lower the sales tax from its
current 6.25 percent. The Legislature raised the
former 5 percent rate almost eight years ago as
part of a plan to generate $1 billion in new
revenue to support the state budget.
In his prepared remarks, Rosenberg called the
proposed sales tax cut "a very bad idea"
although he did not use those words in his
speech. Speaker DeLeo has said he cannot see
himself supporting a sales tax cut as it would
put Massachusetts "in a more precarious
financial situation."
State House News Service
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
House budget will again turn on mega-amendments
By Colin A. Young
House members will have until 5 p.m. next
Thursday, April 13, to file amendments to the
fiscal 2018 spending proposal expected to be
released by the House Ways and Means Committee
on Monday morning.
During its session Wednesday, the House adopted
an order (H 3599) establishing the procedures
for its annual budget debate, expected to be
held the week of April 24. The order forbids any
amendments that would alter the marijuana law
approved by voters last November and bars any
"proposition on a subject different from the
amendment under consideration" from being
considered as a further amendment.
Rep. William Galvin, the Rules Committee
chairman, presented the order and Minority
Leader Brad Jones offered a successful amendment
to establish the April 13 amendment deadline.
The House rejected an amendment offered by Rep.
Kevin Kuros which would have prohibited the
House from including more than one consolidated
amendment -- a bundle of amendments on the same
topic compiled into one document -- in a vote.
"In prior years we've ended up with 15 subject
areas of amendments, for example constitutional
officers and state administration, local aid,
elder affairs, et cetera," he said. He added,
"We're going to pass a $41 billion budget with
15 votes, I'm not sure I see a need to
consolidate that down to nine votes."
House members in recent years have dodged tough
political votes by dispensing with amendments
behind closed doors in favor of passing large
consolidated amendments and, in some cases,
reducing the number of recorded votes members
must take by combining more than one
consolidated amendment.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, April 1, 2017
Retiring community college president payout
sparks call for new cap rules
By Matt Stout
A retired community college president’s
staggering $334,000 golden parachute is
breathing new life into calls to rein in the
generous payouts, where reforms to date —
including caps on vacation-time buyouts — have
fallen short of the mark, lawmakers warn.
“It’s mind-blowing,” said state Sen. Ryan
Fattman, a Webster Republican. “There has to be
something that can be done legislatively and I
think these are the types of stories that give
those efforts a lot of traction. This is
something my staff and I have been talking a lot
about.
The big payday Daniel Asquino stands to earn
from his retirement after three decades at Mount
Wachusett Community College is fueled largely by
a whopping $266,060 payout — split into two
checks — for more than 1,250 days of unused sick
time, according to the college.
Combined with $68,079 in unused vacation time,
Asquino stands to rake in even more than the
$269,984 former Bridgewater State University
President Dana Mohler-Faria got in 2015, then
considered the largest payout from the last
decade.
Mohler-Faria’s case prompted the state’s Board
of Higher Education to draft new rules for the
state’s colleges, which capped vacation payouts
at 64 days and didn’t allow any unused vacation
time to be converted into earned sick time,
which can be cashed out at 20 percent its value
come retirement.
Asquino’s payday — first reported yesterday by
the Worcester Telegram & Gazette — falls within
those legal stands, thanks to his massive supply
of unused sick time. He told the paper he rarely
took time off.
But Fattman said he’s concerned the new rules
could encourage current employees to simply use
vacation days even when they’re sick, in an
effort to rack up uncapped sick time come
retirement.
Gov. Charlie Baker yesterday called Asquino’s
payout “disappointing.”
“Governor Baker believes all state entities must
take fiscal responsibility seriously,” his
spokesman, Billy Pitman, said.
Baker is floating for the second time a proposal
that would cap and freeze all unused sick time
at 1,000 hours for state employees. But the
legislation applies solely to those who work
under the executive branch.
A separate bill imposing the same 1,000-hour
cap, filed by House Minority Leader Brad Jones,
is intended to “touch (public college employees)
as well, because they’re technically state
employees,” he said.
“We would be as expansive as possible,” the
North Reading Republican said. “Even if you
capped it at 1,000 hours, you’d basically get
half your salary as your sick-leave buyback.
That’s a potentially huge exposure to the
commonwealth.”
Efforts to reach Chris Gabrieli, the chair of
the state’s Board of Higher Education, weren’t
successful yesterday.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
A Boston Herald editorial
A dose of reform
With each eye-popping payout to a retiring state
employee the powers-that-be make an attempt to
limit future damage. But the new rules never
seem to apply broadly enough. That ought to
change.
As the Herald reported Saturday, Daniel Asquino
walked away from the presidency of Mount
Wachusett Community College with an extra
$334,000 — most of which he is owed simply for
not getting sick very often.
Asquino’s 1,250 days of unused sick time,
accrued over a three-decade career at the head
of the school (47 years in public higher ed) is
being converted into $266,000 in cash, while the
remainder of the payout comes from unused
vacation time.
“Wait!” you might be thinking. “I thought they
fixed that.”
Well, kinda/sorta.
After cutting a $269,984 check to retiring
Bridgewater State College president Dana
Mohler-Faria in 2015 — which ignited a storm of
public criticism — the state’s Board of Higher
Education adopted new limits for nonunion state
college administrators. There’s a 64-day cap on
vacation accrual (it will be lowered to 50 days
as of 2019), and unused vacation time in excess
of that cap is no longer converted to sick time,
a portion of which can then be converted to cash
upon retirement.
But even with the new limits in place, Asquino’s
longevity on the public payroll — and his
apparently extraordinary health — still entitle
him to perks enjoyed by very few people in the
public or private sectors. And while it
is legal, it is far too generous.
Gov. Charlie Baker has included in his budget
plan for next year a measure to cap unused sick
time at 1,000 hours for state employees who work
in the executive branch, which ought to be the
starting point (lawmakers refused to act on the
same proposal last year). House minority leader
Brad Jones (R-North Reading) is backing a bill
that would include public college employees, too
— arguing the need to be “as expansive as
possible.”
By all means, be expansive. Taxpayers can no
longer afford to subsidize the lavish retirement
dreams of college administrators who work in the
cushiest corner of state government. |
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