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and the
Citizens Economic Research Foundation
Post Office Box 1147 ●
Marblehead, Massachusetts 01945 ●
(508)
915-3665
“Every Tax is a Pay Cut ... A Tax Cut is a Pay Raise”
44 years as “The Voice of Massachusetts Taxpayers”
— and
their Institutional Memory — |
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CLT UPDATE
Thursday, July 26, 2018
Senate
passes yet another new tax
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Senate Session - 3 PM - 10:11 PM -
Wednesday, July 25, 2018
...The Senate on Wednesday night added measures governing
regional transportation taxes ...
AMENDMENT 229: Boncore regional ballot
initiatives.
Sen. Boncore said regional ballot initiatives is a
measure that passed the Senate previously. It allows
municipalities to raise additional money for transportation
projects. It would allow more than one municipality
to come together and have a ballot initiative. This creates
for the adoption of new and improved taxes for the
design of new projects. This gives the voters the
opportunity to come forward and say we need more
revenue for projects, bike lanes, ferries. It allows
municipalities and regions to decide. They could raise
a new tax and decide the length of the new tax....
Sen. Tarr said said I appreciate the
expertise that Sen. Boncore brings. There just is no relent
in the desire of some to try to find new ways to impose
taxes in the Commonwealth. We can allow municipal
governments and the voters and it just won't cease until
there are higher taxes. We can create regional
organizations. It just never ends. I agree to some of the
need. Municipalities do have the ability to override
Proposition 2½ to fund projects if they think they are
important.....
BY A
ROLL CALL VOTE OF 27-10, AMENDMENT ADOPTED.
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Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
Late last evening I discovered that the
state Senate had just voted (9:47 PM, after suspending
its rules to vote later than allowed) to pass yet
another end-run around our Proposition 2½.
We alerted you about this "regional transportation tax"
in the CLT Update of July 15, "The
Beacon Hill Way: Tax and Spend Ever More"), when it
was before the Senate Ways and Means Committee.
While debating a $600 million "economic
development bill" yesterday, near the end of the
late-evening debate Sen. Joseph Boncore (D-Winthrop)
slipped in his brainchild, a regional transportation
tax, as an amendment. According to an earlier
report on this (in which I was quoted), the Beacon Hill
Roll Call on July 15 reported:
"[It] would allow cities and towns, with the
approval of local voters on a ballot question,
to increase taxes on payroll, sales, property,
fuel, or vehicle excise tax. The funds could be
used only for transportation-related purposes
including maintaining, repairing, planning,
operating, improving and constructing public
transportation and transit systems, including
roads, bridges, bikeways and pedestrian
pathways."
The short debate in full can be read
below. Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr
(R-Gloucester) forced a roll call vote on it. All
seven Republican senators, reinforced by Democrats Joan
Lovely (D-Salem), Kathleen O'Connor Ives
(D-Newburyport), and Walter Timilty (D-Milton), voted
against it.
At 9:47 PM last night it passed by a
vote of 27-10.
SEE HOW DID YOUR STATE SENATOR VOTED HERE
It's getting ever more difficult to
catch and keep up with all these devious, creative
attempts to bypass and end-run our Proposition 2½.
At least someone in Massachusetts is watching the
taxpayers' backs and alerting you, for a little while
longer.
It's possible that
this will go no further, as this change would now also
need a vote in the House. The State House News
Service observed: "It's unclear exactly how
the House and Senate will reconcile the differing
versions of the major bills, since the deadline for
appointing conference committees passed on July 17."
It's just as possible
― in this frenzied climate
of suspended legislative rules and hasty votes without
debate (like most in the Senate yesterday)
― that it'll whiz through
both branches before the Legislature's summer/fall
recess (aka, vacation) begins next Wednesday.
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Chip Ford
Executive Director |
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State House News Service
Wednesday, July 25, 2018
Senate Session - 3 PM - 10:11 PM - Wednesday,
July 25, 2018
...The Senate on Wednesday night added
measures governing regional transportation taxes,
debt collection reforms, and the right to repair
digital electronic devices to a $600 million
economic development bill. It's unclear exactly
how the House and Senate will reconcile the
differing versions of the major bills, since the
deadline for appointing conference committees
passed on July 17. Senate Democrats plan an
11:30 a.m. caucus Thursday in Senate President
Harriette Chandler's office before a 1 p.m.
session where Senate Ways and Means Chair Karen
Spilka is scheduled to be elected as the new
Senate president...
AMENDMENT 229: Boncore regional ballot
initiatives.
Sen. Boncore said regional ballot
initiatives is a measure that passed the Senate
previously. It allows municipalities to raise
additional money for transportation projects. It
would allow more than one municipality to come
together and have a ballot initiative. This
creates for the adoption of new and improved
taxes for the design of new projects. This gives
the voters the opportunity to come forward and
say we need more revenue for projects, bike
lanes, ferries. It allows municipalities and
regions to decide. They could raise a new tax
and decide the length of the new tax. They would
not be in perpetuity. And of course these would
be earmarked for transportation projects. I
can't stress enough the aging infrastructure.
The complexity to bring new projects has been
difficult and with no real knowledge of what the
federal government will do around
transportation, this is important. We have
established no new source of revenue. Our local
roads and bridges are at a $5 billion state of
good repair deficit. This is a measure that has
passed in 41 other states. It has gone very far
in Seattle in producing light rail, and its high
speed ferry service, another thing that is
needed in the Commonwealth. We hear time and
time again from the administration that there
just isn't funding to do it.
Sen. Tarr requested a roll call and there
was support.
Sen. Tarr said I appreciate the expertise
that Sen. Boncore brings. There just is no
relent in the desire of some to try to find new
ways to impose taxes in the Commonwealth. We can
allow municipal governments and the voters and
it just won't cease until there are higher
taxes. We can create regional organizations. It
just never ends. I agree to some of the need.
Municipalities do have the ability to override
Proposition 2½ to fund projects if they think
they are important. Having a hodgepodge
patchwork of different taxes, clearly we should
find a way to address some of these need. I
wonder if this amendment would address that
state of good repair, which is generally cited
as a need of the Commonwealth. I know we will
hear lots of eloquence.
Sen. Lesser said communities can band together
as regions. You could see this in western
Massachusetts for rail or the North Shore for
ferry service. Nothing happens without multiple
steps including first forming the regions.
Voters would decide on their own. This is how
Denver has invested and created their light rail
system. It's been used in Charlotte and Atlanta.
Massachusetts is behind the eight ball.
BY A
ROLL CALL VOTE OF 27-10, AMENDMENT ADOPTED.
Sen. Chandler voted yes.
Sen. Chandler said we have three more amendments
and one is a corrective. Time was 9:47 p.m.
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