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Post Office Box 1147 ●
Marblehead, Massachusetts 01945 ●
(781) 639-9709
“Every Tax is a Pay Cut ... A Tax Cut is a Pay Raise”
45 years as “The Voice of Massachusetts Taxpayers”
— and
their Institutional Memory — |
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CLT UPDATE
Saturday, August 31, 2019
Some
legislators begin to stir
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The Legislature is not expected to rush back
to Beacon Hill after Labor Day, and when they get around to
returning to the capitol, the fall agenda includes agreeing
to landmark education funding and reform legislation, and
proposing and advancing a revenue package to invest in
public transportation.
The latter task is influenced by the fact
that the Legislature is already advancing a $2 billion
Constitutional amendment to hit the state's wealthiest
residents with new income taxes to pay for transportation
and education, as well as the fact that tax revenues have
been gushing into state coffers.
According to the Massachusetts High Tech
Council, which is resisting bids to hit businesses with new
taxes, state tax revenues increased 58 percent between
fiscal 2009 and fiscal 2019 and grew by $4 billion in the
last two years alone.
As House leaders mull transportation revenue
options, Revenue Committee Co-chair Sen. Adam Hinds will
reconvene a Senate working group at the State House on
Wednesday as it continues to review all state tax policies.
State House News Service
Friday, August 30, 2019
Advances - Week of Sept. 1, 2019
Business organizations that have resisted
new or higher taxes to funnel more money into public
transportation are hitting back at the
advocacy group Raise Up Massachusetts and its call for an
"economically progressive" revenue package, delivering a
one-two punch as this week began.
The left-hand jab came from the
Massachusetts High Technology Council, which took aim Sunday
afternoon at Raise Up's "increasingly aggressive stance" in
favor of raising taxes on businesses, and the Associated
Industries of Massachusetts followed up Monday morning with
a right cross in the form of an open letter from President
and CEO John Regan.
"Thousands of hard-working Massachusetts
employers, from software startups to corner grocery stores,
spend every day paying their fair share to the commonwealth
by providing economic opportunity and prosperity from Boston
to the Berkshires," Regan wrote. "These employers understand
the need to address intractable issues such as
transportation and education, but they also understand that
the recent examples provided by Connecticut and New Jersey
prove that you cannot solve these problems by punitively
taxing certain businesses or individuals."
The business groups' latest volley came in
response to Raise Up's own open letter to lawmakers last
week in which the organization that has been behind the
proposed 4 percent surtax on income over $1 million called
on businesses to contribute more towards public transit and
education. Meanwhile, state lawmakers are gearing up to
debate a broad transportation financing package this fall,
the details of which have not been released....
In a public policy update newsletter to
supporters on Sunday, the High Tech Council dismissed Raise
Up's letter and its latest lobbying efforts by reiterating
its long-held position that Massachusetts does not have a
revenue problem.
"With tax collections rising at three times
the rate of inflation over the past 10 years, it is
abundantly clear that Massachusetts does not have a revenue
problem despite repeated claims by some that billions in new
taxes must be imposed to support state spending," the
council wrote....
In his open letter to Raise Up, AIM
President and CEO John Regan said that Raise Up's recent
letter to lawmakers "does not comport with facts" and he
detailed the ways in which the business community
contributes to the state.
"Massachusetts employers provide 3.2 million
private-sector jobs at a mean annual wage of $63,910 to the
citizens of Massachusetts ... Massachusetts employers pay
more than $3.3 billion annually in corporate excise and
other state taxes, Massachusetts employers pay $4.9 billion
annually in local property taxes to support schools, public
safety and municipal services, Massachusetts employers pay
$22.8 billion per year to provide health insurance to their
employees," Regan wrote....
The High Tech Council, in its email over the
weekend, took note of Raise Up's "increasingly aggressive
stance" and said the advocacy group's latest lobbying is "a
clear indication that they are concerned that thoughtful
policymakers will realize that the Fair Share Amendment is a
revenue-centric 'solution' to a revenue shortage that simply
does not exist."
In June, the Legislature voted 147-48 in
favor of a Constitutional amendment (H 86) that would impose
a 4 percent surtax on annual household income greater than
$1 million, well more than the 101 votes needed to advance
to the next vote.
The so-called "millionaires tax" will need
to be passed again at a Constitutional Convention in the
2021-2022 legislative session in order to go before voters
on the November 2022 ballot. The amendment is required
because the state's constitution currently mandates that a
tax on income be applied evenly to all residents.
State House News Service
Monday, August 26, 2019
Biz groups have guard up ahead of tax debate
The Transportation Committee is gearing up
for a busy fall, with public hearings on Gov. Charlie
Baker's $18 billion transportation bill and legislation that
would allow undocumented immigrants to receive driver's
licenses and another session likely to probe Registry of
Motor Vehicles failings.
Chairs Rep. William Straus and Sen. Joseph
Boncore announced Tuesday that they had scheduled three
hearings across September and October, two of which will
feature testimony on some of the most high-profile
legislation pending before the committee....
On Oct. 8, the committee will hear testimony
on the $18 billion transportation borrowing bill Baker filed
last month. His proposal would direct billions of dollars
more to the MBTA, boost funding available for road and
bridge improvements, and direct future revenue from the
multi-state Transportation Climate Initiative — whose
money-generating mechanics still have not been announced —
to public transit....
Also on the docket for the fall is a broad
debate on transportation funding, though that will likely
come before the full House rather than just before the
Transportation Committee. House Speaker Robert DeLeo has
pledged that his branch will debate a range of revenue
options when it returns.
Among the options that members have raised,
DeLeo said earlier this month, is another pass at tying the
state's gas tax to inflation, something that was included in
a 2013 bill and then repealed by a ballot initiative a year
later.
Straus has expressed support this session
for increasing the gas tax as a way to generate revenue for
the state's growing transportation infrastructure needs.
State House News Service
Wednesday, August 28, 2019
Transpo panel prepping for busy fall
There was a time when cheating the
government on sales or meals taxes was a low-tech operation.
It was no mystery why the local pizza joint had two cash
registers — one whose receipts got reported, one not so
much.
Times change, technology changes, but the
human instinct to cheat the government, well, it goes on and
on.
So at a time when many advocates for
increased funding for education and transportation are
looking to hike state taxes, the “leakage” of tax dollars is
particularly shameful. And so is the Legislature’s
reluctance to make even the most incremental changes to
capture those lost tax dollars....
There are indeed multiple technologies now
available to reduce fraud and get tax revenues into state
coffers faster and more efficiently — allowing the “float”
to accrue not to retailers but to the state treasury.
Baker was right in 2017 when he first
proposed the idea. Want more money for education and
transportation in a relatively painless way? Then the state
should do a better job of collecting the taxes consumers are
already paying.
A Boston Globe editorial
Wednesday, August 28, 2019
One way to raise revenue: crack down on tax cheats
State lawmakers continue to rack up
taxpayer-funded legal bills following a wave of sexual
harassment scandals on Beacon Hill, and the spending could
continue as the sex assault trial of former Senate President
Stanley Rosenberg’s husband Byron Hefner begins next month.
Senate President Karen Spilka and House
Speaker Robert DeLeo have spent more than $500,000 on
outside counsel since the #MeToo movement gripped the Golden
Dome in 2017. Critics are unclear, however, whether the
spending has changed the culture on Beacon Hill.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
#MeToo forces taxpayer-funded legal bills for State House
scandals
Spending could continue as Hefner trial begins
It should be called the sexual harassment
tax. It’s paid by every taxpayer in the Commonwealth and
it’s the money we are being required to invest in trying to
make sure our elected officials don’t sexually assault the
citizens or each other.
As the Herald’s Hillary Chabot reported,
Senate President Karen Spilka and House Speaker Robert DeLeo
have spent more than $500,000 on outside counsel since 2017.
It is hubris of the highest order and
largely bureaucratic wheel-spinning.
“Whenever something scandalous happens in
government, we pay for a study and suddenly someone new is
hired,” said state Rep. Shaunna O’Connell (R-Taunton). “All
we really need is to hold people responsible for their bad
actions.”
It seems obvious to most of us, but that
kind of thinking is out of favor on Beacon Hill, where
accountability is a mythical concept and transparency
reserved for the poor slobs who weren’t lucky enough to
serve in the legislature — a body exempt from public records
laws.
A Boston Herald editorial
Thursday, August 29, 2019
Taxpayer-funded legal fees are an abomination
Citizens cover costs of sexual harassment scandals
Sitting in front of a room full of people in
two different shades of orange -- one on Gun Owners Action
League baseball caps, the other on End Gun Violence T-shirts
-- Rep. David Linsky compared receiving a firearms permit
without first having to shoot a gun to earning a driver's
license without ever getting behind the wheel.
By way of a rejoinder later on in
Wednesday's Public Safety Committee hearing, GOAL head Jim
Wallace contrasted the number of people who went to the
emergency room for a firearm-related injury in 2015 (166)
with those who visited after a motor vehicle accident
(73,000, he said).
"So please, don't regulate guns like cars,"
Wallace said. "And I often joke that when you come to one of
our shooting ranges, and you see a sign that says 'No
texting and shooting,' then you can come talk to us about
firearm safety."
With only a couple days passed since that
hearing, it will likely be a while still until the committee
decides what additional gun regulations it might pursue. So
in the meantime, how are things looking on the
regulating-cars front?
The House-Senate stalemate over distracted
driving legislation is now another week staler. Advocates
hoped dramatic footage of a texting-while-driving crash in
Berlin would help spur lawmakers to reach a deal to ban the
use of handheld devices by drivers. But nothing happened on
that front this week....
September, when it arrives, will bring more
activity on Beacon Hill, though signs of activity are
gradually reappearing in the marbled halls and stuffy
hearing rooms of the State House.
The Public Safety Committee's gun hearing
was the first committee hearing since July 30, and the
Transportation Committee this week sketched out a fall
agenda that features hearings on driver's licenses for
undocumented immigrants and a transportation borrowing bill
Baker filed July 25....
State House News Service
Friday, August 30, 2019
Weekly Roundup - Goodbye August
DRIVER'S LICENSES FOR UNDOCUMENTED IMMIGRANTS: Committee on
Transportation holds a hearing on legislation (H 3012/S
2061) filed by Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier of Pittsfield and
Sen. Brendan Crighton of Lynn that would allow undocumented
immigrants residing in the state to acquire driver's
licenses.
The issue has not previously gained traction on Beacon Hill,
but progressive lawmakers this session have renewed the
push, arguing it will make the roads safer for everyone and
ease stress on undocumented families.
The bill would permit all qualified residents, regardless of
immigration status, to receive a standard license under the
state's now-two-tiered system. The legislation would not
affect federal Real ID-compliant licenses, which require
proof of citizenship or lawful residence as well as a Social
Security number. The bill also includes privacy protection
measures. It proposes that an individual's documents could
only be released by subpoena or court order and that
licenses could not be the basis for prosecution.
At least 12 states, including Connecticut and Vermont, have
laws in place allowing all residents to acquire some type of
license or permit regardless of immigration status. The
license bill is the only legislation on the docket for the
Transportation Committee's hearing. (Wednesday, 10 a.m.,
Hearing Room B-1).
State House News Service
Friday, August 30, 2019
Advances - Week of Sept. 1, 2019
In a sign of the widening rift between
Governor Charlie Baker and the state GOP, party officials
have quietly dismantled the lucrative — and controversial —
fund-raising operation that helped pump millions toward the
second-term Republican’s two campaign victories.
The Massachusetts Victory Committee, a joint
effort the MassGOP launched with the Republican National
Committee in 2013, has collapsed in recent months, taking in
next to no cash after raising $11 million over the previous
five years.
Jim Lyons, a conservative former lawmaker
elected as party chairman in January, has also scuttled the
state GOP’s longtime fund-raisers, and he has questioned
spending at both MassVictory and the party under Baker
allies.
The moves, some in and around the party
fear, could sap the long cash-strapped GOP of badly needed
resources at a time when the fractures between Lyons, a
President Trump supporter, and the more moderate Baker, a
Trump critic, have never appeared wider....
Fissures have been forming for months
between the Lyons-led party and Baker, its titular head.
Under the former Andover lawmaker, the state GOP has adopted
a pro-Trump tone far to the right of Baker’s more moderate
brand, and Baker has retained his own staff as he mulls
seeking a third term. The governor had used party employees
and the MassGOP headquarters for its operations after he
first took office in 2015, helping cover overhead costs as
Baker raised record-breaking amounts.
Baker’s political team is also now renting a
$3,000-a-month office on West Street, providing a physical
example of the separation between the governor and the party
apparatus.
Then, in August, the divide spilled directly
in the public realm when the two sides clashed over
lucrative donor databases that temporarily locked both out
of the data by software giant Salesforce.com.
The party staff has since regained access to
the database, according to a letter its lawyer sent Lyons
roughly two weeks after they threatened legal action against
the company.
The Boston Globe
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
Chasm between Baker, state GOP grows
as lucrative fund-raising operation is dismantled
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Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
"The
Legislature is not expected to rush back to Beacon Hill
after Labor Day," the State House New Service noted,
"and when they get around to returning . . ." it'll be
back to business as usual, I predict. Hopefully
legislators haven't used this taxpayer-funded extended
time off to scheme for another
obscene pay grab immediately upon return,
considering the massive $2 billion revenue surplus
(over-taxation) from last fiscal year
— but assuredly they have
used their absence to plot tax hikes.
The Gimme
Lobby's current front-group, Raise Up Massachusetts
comprised of the usual suspects over the past decades,
is the "progressive" cabal behind the so-called
"Millionaires Tax" amendment to the state constitution,
which would create for the first time a state Graduated
Income Tax. Predicted to rake in $2 billion in
additional revenue —
allegedly earmarked for "education and transportation"
but we know better — as
always is declared still not enough. It's
pushing for even more, more, always more.
According to the
State House News Service, of any new transportation
tax:
Raise
Up said any near-term revenue proposal must include
a commitment from the Legislature to continue the
work necessary to get the millionaire's tax before
voters on the 2022 ballot, must be "economically
progressive" to bring the share of the burden on
higher-income people in line with that of
lower-income residents, must raise enough revenue to
meet the state's needs and must be "supported by the
public and capable of surviving attempted repeal."
According to
the State House News Service, longtime CLT ally, the
Massachusetts High Technology Council, responded:
In a
public policy update newsletter to supporters on
Sunday, the High Tech Council dismissed Raise Up's
letter and its latest lobbying efforts by
reiterating its long-held position that
Massachusetts does not have a revenue problem.
"With
tax collections rising at three times the rate of
inflation over the past 10 years, it is abundantly
clear that Massachusetts does not have a revenue
problem despite repeated claims by some that
billions in new taxes must be imposed to support
state spending," the council wrote.
Regardless, it
appears that the "low-hanging
fruit" among many legislators as a starting point
will be another gas tax hike —
indexed to inflation —
again. The voters
repealed that indexing scheme attached to the last
gas tax hike in 2014 with 53-47% of the vote, but when
has the will of the voters ever mattered to or stopped
The Best Legislature Money Can Buy?
According to a
State House News Service report on August 5 ("Gas prices
dip, demand down compared to last year"):
One possible remedy that
some state representatives have already approached
[House Speaker Robert] DeLeo to say they would
support is another attempt to tie the state's gas
tax to inflation.
"Some members have already
approached me on it, they feel that they could
support," the speaker said at a Greater Boston
Chamber of Commerce breakfast in March. "It's never
an easy issue to take up, but again, I think we're
at a stage where if we're going to get serious about
addressing this issue then everything and anything
has to be on the table." . . .
Motorists pay 24 cents per
gallon in state gas tax, fractions of a penny below
the national average, according to the U.S. Energy
Information Administration. For each gallon of gas,
drivers also pay a fee of roughly 2.5 cents to
support the Underground Storage Tank Petroleum
Product Cleanup Fund. When all state and federal
assessments are calculated in, about 45 cents of
every gallon of gas pumped in Massachusetts goes to
taxes or fees.
In the budget for the fiscal
year that started July 1, Massachusetts is expecting
to bring in $847.7 million in revenue from taxes on
motor fuel, including gasoline and diesel, which is
subject to the same state taxes and fees.
Meanwhile some
legislators bored with so much time off have taken to
holding hearings on more crazy legislation. In one
of the most firearms-restricted states in the nation the
never-ending push is ongoing for even more restrictions
with scores of new bills being heard this week before
the Public Safety Committee. Again, more is never
enough and never will be.
The
Transportation Committee will hear testimony on
Wednesday on two bills to again attempt to provide
Massachusetts driver's licenses to illegal aliens. Back
in January at a State House rally flanked by advocates
for licensing illegals, Senate sponsor Sen. Brendan Crighton
(D-Lynn) said of his bill (the "Work and Family Mobility
Act"):
"This
is a very straightforward issue with a common-sense
solution. There is simply no rational argument for
prohibiting undocumented immigrants from earning
their driver's licenses. These are our neighbors,
these are our students, this is our workforce, our
family, our friends, and these are the constituents
we all represent."
This week we
learned that the House and Senate have spent half a
million of our dollars —
"money we are being required to invest in trying to make
sure our elected officials don’t sexually assault the
citizens or each other" as the Boston Herald described
it. And more is predicted to be squandered ahead.
But voters
keep re-electing these miscreants.
The "shootout
in the lifeboat" political sideshow among state
Republican party leaders and Governor Baker's outside
fundraising team continues to distract. How sad
for taxpayers of Massachusetts that even miniscule, the
only opposition party to the overwhelming progressive
political machine finds so much time and energy to fight
among themselves. But are they actually fighting
among themselves as Republicans, or for survival
of a Republican Party in any sense whatsoever in
Massachusetts — a role as
any sort of opposition?
Whatever, the
Progressive Democrat Machine steadily lumbers along
trampling everything in its way without distraction.
Let's hope we
taxpayers can all come together again to defeat or
deflect The Progressive Machine's coming tax hikes
assault.
And let's hope
someday soon enough voters will arise from their
Battered Citizen Syndrome and fight back.
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Chip Ford
Executive Director |
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State House News Service
Friday, August 30, 2019
Advances - Week of Sept. 1, 2019
The Legislature is not expected to rush back to
Beacon Hill after Labor Day, and when they get
around to returning to the capitol, the fall
agenda includes agreeing to landmark education
funding and reform legislation, and proposing
and advancing a revenue package to invest in
public transportation.
The latter task is influenced by the fact that
the Legislature is already advancing a $2
billion Constitutional amendment to hit the
state's wealthiest residents with new income
taxes to pay for transportation and education,
as well as the fact that tax revenues have been
gushing into state coffers.
According to the Massachusetts High Tech
Council, which is resisting bids to hit
businesses with new taxes, state tax revenues
increased 58 percent between fiscal 2009 and
fiscal 2019 and grew by $4 billion in the last
two years alone.
As House leaders mull transportation revenue
options, Revenue Committee Co-chair Sen. Adam
Hinds will reconvene a Senate working group at
the State House on Wednesday as it continues to
review all state tax policies.
Legislative committees next week will tackle
addiction and overdose-related bills and hear a
push for legislation authorizing driver's
licenses for undocumented immigrants. Meantime,
a public safety [distracted driving] bill with
overwhelming support in the House and Senate on
Friday marks its 73rd day in the dark recesses
of a six-member conference committee controlled
by Beacon Hill Democrats....
WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 4, 2019
DRIVER'S LICENSES FOR UNDOCUMENTED
IMMIGRANTS: Committee on Transportation
holds a hearing on legislation (H 3012/S 2061)
filed by Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier of
Pittsfield and Sen. Brendan Crighton of Lynn
that would allow undocumented immigrants
residing in the state to acquire driver's
licenses.
The issue has not previously gained traction on
Beacon Hill, but progressive lawmakers this
session have renewed the push, arguing it will
make the roads safer for everyone and ease
stress on undocumented families.
The bill would permit all qualified residents,
regardless of immigration status, to receive a
standard license under the state's
now-two-tiered system. The legislation would not
affect federal Real ID-compliant licenses, which
require proof of citizenship or lawful residence
as well as a Social Security number. The bill
also includes privacy protection measures. It
proposes that an individual's documents could
only be released by subpoena or court order and
that licenses could not be the basis for
prosecution.
At least 12 states, including Connecticut and
Vermont, have laws in place allowing all
residents to acquire some type of license or
permit regardless of immigration status. The
license bill is the only legislation on the
docket for the Transportation Committee's
hearing. (Wednesday, 10 a.m., Hearing Room B-1)
...
SENATE REVENUE GROUP: A group convened by
Senate leaders to examine state tax policy
resumes its deliberation. Revenue Committee
Co-chairman Sen. Adam Hinds chairs the panel.
It's an open meeting. (Wednesday, 2 p.m., Room
428)
State House News
Service
Monday, August 26, 2019
Biz groups have guard up ahead of tax debate
By Colin A. Young
Business organizations that have resisted new or
higher taxes to funnel more money into public
transportation are hitting back at the advocacy
group Raise Up Massachusetts and its call for an
"economically progressive" revenue package,
delivering a one-two punch as this week began.
The left-hand jab came from the Massachusetts
High Technology Council, which took aim Sunday
afternoon at Raise Up's "increasingly aggressive
stance" in favor of raising taxes on businesses,
and the Associated Industries of Massachusetts
followed up Monday morning with a right cross in
the form of an open letter from President and
CEO John Regan.
"Thousands of hard-working Massachusetts
employers, from software startups to corner
grocery stores, spend every day paying their
fair share to the commonwealth by providing
economic opportunity and prosperity from Boston
to the Berkshires," Regan wrote. "These
employers understand the need to address
intractable issues such as transportation and
education, but they also understand that the
recent examples provided by Connecticut and New
Jersey prove that you cannot solve these
problems by punitively taxing certain businesses
or individuals."
The business groups' latest volley came in
response to Raise Up's own open letter to
lawmakers last week in which the organization
that has been behind the proposed 4 percent
surtax on income over $1 million called on
businesses to contribute more towards public
transit and education. Meanwhile, state
lawmakers are gearing up to debate a broad
transportation financing package this fall, the
details of which have not been released.
"Large, profitable corporations benefit greatly
from a well-educated workforce and a reliable
transportation system, and it's time for them to
contribute themselves to fund those investments,
not just ask the rest of us to pay more," Raise
Up Massachusetts wrote in its letter. "The
Massachusetts corporate community needs to
explain just how businesses plan to do their
part to fund our transportation and public
education systems."
Business groups have increasingly decried the
Boston area's public transportation woes as a
hindrance to economic growth. Traffic and
congestion on the roads make for long and
frustrating commutes by car, and the
unpredictable nature of public transportation
frequently makes workers late to their jobs.
In a public policy update newsletter to
supporters on Sunday, the High Tech Council
dismissed Raise Up's letter and its latest
lobbying efforts by reiterating its long-held
position that Massachusetts does not have a
revenue problem.
"With tax collections rising at three times the
rate of inflation over the past 10 years, it is
abundantly clear that Massachusetts does not
have a revenue problem despite repeated claims
by some that billions in new taxes must be
imposed to support state spending," the council
wrote.
Raise Up said Monday that while it has some
major differences of opinion with many business
groups, most have acknowledged that the state's
transportation system needs more money.
"It is alarming to see the High Tech Council
continue to deny the need for revenue when the
employees of high tech businesses in
Massachusetts are sitting for hours on
broken-down trains, they're stuck on
[Interstate] 93 for hours waiting to get to
work," Andrew Farnitano, spokesman for the Raise
Up coalition, said. "Our high tech economy
cannot work unless we fix our transportation
system and clearly these incredibly profitable
large corporations in the high tech industry
have a role to play."
The differences in opinion come into play when
discussing where that additional money should
come from, Farnitano said. He said many business
groups agree that more revenue is needed, but
argue it should come in the form of higher user
fees paid on each ride with a service like Lyft
or Uber. Raise Up is "concerned about the impact
of user fees on working people," Farnitano said.
Ahead of this fall's debate, Raise Up is not yet
at the point of being ready to propose a
specific option to raise the revenue it says the
state needs, but Farnitano told the News Service
the organization "want[s] to have a conversation
about" higher corporate excise taxes.
"It's a shared responsibility. We think there's
a role for businesses to play, this can't just
be on the backs of working people and
commuters," he said. "The business community
needs to offer a solution of how they intend to
pay. We're asking large corporations to propose
how they can contribute."
In his open letter to Raise Up, AIM President
and CEO John Regan said that Raise Up's recent
letter to lawmakers "does not comport with
facts" and he detailed the ways in which the
business community contributes to the state.
"Massachusetts employers provide 3.2 million
private-sector jobs at a mean annual wage of
$63,910 to the citizens of Massachusetts ...
Massachusetts employers pay more than $3.3
billion annually in corporate excise and other
state taxes, Massachusetts employers pay $4.9
billion annually in local property taxes to
support schools, public safety and municipal
services, Massachusetts employers pay $22.8
billion per year to provide health insurance to
their employees," Regan wrote.
If the High Tech Council was playing bad cop
with its pointed language, AIM played the part
of good cop Monday. Regan said he believes Raise
Up's letter last week was "a serious statement
of position and concern, rather than a political
stunt" because he got to know the organization
well during the time AIM and Raise Up worked
together to reach a compromise on a paid family
and medical leave program.
"We spent too many hours sitting across the
bargaining table from one another for me to
question the fact that you believe that
businesses do not pay their fair share," Regan
wrote. He later added, "I am delighted to engage
in serious conversations with Raise Up and any
other groups seeking to ensure the economic
future of Massachusetts."
Raise Up disagrees with AIM on a lot of things,
but the two organizations have worked together
successfully in the past and will endeavor to do
the same on this issue, Farnitano said.
"We think this is an area where there are strong
differences but we can talk about those
differences and we can work out solutions that
involve the business community and workers
coming to the table and identifying the
solutions for the problems our commonwealth
faces," he said.
The High Tech Council, in its email over the
weekend, took note of Raise Up's "increasingly
aggressive stance" and said the advocacy group's
latest lobbying is "a clear indication that they
are concerned that thoughtful policymakers will
realize that the Fair Share Amendment is a
revenue-centric 'solution' to a revenue shortage
that simply does not exist."
In June, the Legislature voted 147-48 in favor
of a Constitutional amendment (H 86) that would
impose a 4 percent surtax on annual household
income greater than $1 million, well more than
the 101 votes needed to advance to the next
vote.
The so-called "millionaires tax" will need to be
passed again at a Constitutional Convention in
the 2021-2022 legislative session in order to go
before voters on the November 2022 ballot. The
amendment is required because the state's
constitution currently mandates that a tax on
income be applied evenly to all residents.
State House News
Service
Wednesday, August 28, 2019
Transpo panel prepping for busy fall
By Chris Lisinski
The Transportation Committee is gearing up for a
busy fall, with public hearings on Gov. Charlie
Baker's $18 billion transportation bill and
legislation that would allow undocumented
immigrants to receive driver's licenses and
another session likely to probe Registry of
Motor Vehicles failings.
Chairs Rep. William Straus and Sen. Joseph
Boncore announced Tuesday that they had
scheduled three hearings across September and
October, two of which will feature testimony on
some of the most high-profile legislation
pending before the committee.
The group will meet on Sept. 4 to consider two
bills (H 3012 / S 2061) that would allow
undocumented immigrants who live in
Massachusetts to receive standard state
licenses. Similar legislation has stalled out in
the past, and Gov. Charlie Baker has opposed the
proposal, but supporters say the two-tiered
system under the new federal Real ID regulations
would accommodate the change.
On Oct. 8, the committee will hear testimony on
the $18 billion transportation borrowing bill
Baker filed last month. His proposal would
direct billions of dollars more to the MBTA,
boost funding available for road and bridge
improvements, and direct future revenue from the
multi-state Transportation Climate Initiative —
whose money-generating mechanics still have not
been announced — to public transit.
One of the most significant proposals in the
bill is a $2,000-per-employee tax credit to
promote telecommuting, a change that Baker said
could help reduce roadway congestion.
Although a date has not yet been selected,
Straus told the News Service on Monday that he
also wants to host another oversight hearing to
continue the committee's inquiry into a
still-unfolding scandal about license
suspensions the RMV failed to issue based on
out-of-state driving violations.
When the committee ended its first oversight
hearing after more than seven hours of grilling
RMV employees and state transportation
officials, three witnesses on the initial list
had not been called, including a representative
from Fast Enterprises LLC, which designed the
Registry's record-keeping software involved in
the management breakdown.
Straus said it is possible that the next hearing
could expand the inquiry to further witnesses as
well.
The chairs have been engaged in a testy
back-and-forth with the Baker administration
over access to a range of documents. Department
of Transportation officials said on Aug. 15 they
had provided close to 50,000 pages of materials,
and on Tuesday, they said that figure is now
about 500,000.
However, Straus said "significant requests"
related to employees in the governor's office
who may have been aware of the Registry's
inability to process records still have not been
handed over.
"We have no indication when the administration
intends to comply with what we think are really
key document areas of our request," Straus said.
Straus had previously hinted that the committee
would seek subpoena authority if it did not
receive full cooperation from the
administration. While he did not put a hard
deadline on when the committee would pull the
trigger on seeking a more forceful route, he did
say the committee likely will not send another
request.
"I don't think we'll ever repeat the message,"
he said. "If need be, we would just act to
ensure compliance."
Also on the docket for the fall is a broad
debate on transportation funding, though that
will likely come before the full House rather
than just before the Transportation Committee.
House Speaker Robert DeLeo has pledged that his
branch will debate a range of revenue options
when it returns.
Among the options that members have raised,
DeLeo said earlier this month, is another pass
at tying the state's gas tax to inflation,
something that was included in a 2013 bill and
then repealed by a ballot initiative a year
later.
Straus has expressed support this session for
increasing the gas tax as a way to generate
revenue for the state's growing transportation
infrastructure needs.
Assorted, still unnamed bills will be considered
at a Sept. 17 hearing.
The Boston
Globe
Wednesday, August 28, 2019
A Boston Globe editorial
One way to raise revenue: crack down on tax
cheats
There was a time when cheating the government on
sales or meals taxes was a low-tech operation.
It was no mystery why the local pizza joint had
two cash registers — one whose receipts got
reported, one not so much.
Times change, technology changes, but the human
instinct to cheat the government, well, it goes
on and on.
So at a time when many advocates for increased
funding for education and transportation are
looking to hike state taxes, the “leakage” of
tax dollars is particularly shameful. And so is
the Legislature’s reluctance to make even the
most incremental changes to capture those lost
tax dollars.
Both Governor Charlie Baker and the Senate Ways
and Means Committee proposed language in the
2020 state budget to outlaw tax “zappers” —
known more politely as sales suppression
software. But a scamming device by any other
name would still rob the Massachusetts treasury
of sales and meals taxes already paid by
consumers but diverted by shop and restaurant
owners.
A 2009 study by Richard Ainsworth of Boston
University Law School, a leading authority on
these pernicious little devices, estimated that
fraud in the restaurant industry alone could be
costing the state $600 million in lost revenue.
“If Massachusetts is indeed in need of revenue,
it might do well to look for Zappers and
Phantom-ware installed in the ECRs [electronic
cash registers] of retail establishments that
have a high volume of cash sales,” Ainsworth
wrote back then.
“The physical diversion of funds into a second
drawer is no longer required, and the need for
manual recordkeeping of the skim is eliminated,”
he added.
Our mythical pizza parlor has come into the
digital age.
Not surprisingly, since that study the
technology has grown ever more sophisticated, no
longer the simple thumb-drive inserted into an
existing system but a “fully automated
manipulation of sales data,” Ainsworth wrote in
a 2018 study. By that time the practice had been
unearthed in a chain of Connecticut grocery
stores, a chain of Michigan restaurants where
the proceeds went to fund Hezbollah, strip
joints (shocker, right), and, yes, a host of
pizza joints.
Sure, millions of dollars have been collected
after the fact, but who knows how many scams
have gone undetected? And what about prevention?
At least 25 states have laws on the books that
ban the sale, use, or possession of Zappers.
Washington state — acting in cooperation with
federal prosecutors — has already made good use
of its law. The budget riders proposed by Baker
and by Senate Ways and Means only provided for
civil penalties (the actual tax fraud is a
separate issue) of $10,000 for the user of the
device or software and $25,000 for a seller of
such a device for a first offense. The penalties
doubled for a second offense.
This is hardly trailblazing stuff, but it would
have made a good first step. Yet lawmakers
couldn’t even get this much done.
But the dirty little secret of tax collection —
in addition to such “leakage” — is that
retailers remain happy with business as usual
because the state’s leisurely pace of
collections (some vendors get to hold and earn
interest on the taxes consumers have paid for up
to 50 days) allows them to make money on the
“float.”
Massachusetts has been considering various ways
of expediting that process since 2017, but a
report by the Department of Revenue stopped the
effort in its tracks.
“Our conclusion is that ASTR [Accelerated Sales
Tax Remittance System] would provide substantial
net financial benefits to the state,” the report
noted, although it questioned whether a system
could be implemented before the June 1, 2018,
deadline in the original budget wording.
It couldn’t, and it wasn’t, but DOR also said
“ASTR should be regarded as an achievable
modernization goal using current technology.”
There are indeed multiple technologies now
available to reduce fraud and get tax revenues
into state coffers faster and more efficiently —
allowing the “float” to accrue not to retailers
but to the state treasury.
Baker was right in 2017 when he first proposed
the idea. Want more money for education and
transportation in a relatively painless way?
Then the state should do a better job of
collecting the taxes consumers are already
paying.
The Boston
Herald
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
#MeToo forces taxpayer-funded legal bills for
State House scandals
Spending could continue as Hefner trial begins
By Hillary Chabot
State lawmakers continue to rack up
taxpayer-funded legal bills following a wave of
sexual harassment scandals on Beacon Hill, and
the spending could continue as the sex assault
trial of former Senate President Stanley
Rosenberg’s husband Byron Hefner begins next
month.
Senate President Karen Spilka and House Speaker
Robert DeLeo have spent more than $500,000 on
outside counsel since the #MeToo movement
gripped the Golden Dome in 2017. Critics are
unclear, however, whether the spending has
changed the culture on Beacon Hill.
“Whenever something scandalous happens in
government, we pay for a study and suddenly
someone new is hired,” said state Rep. Shaunna
O’Connell (R-Taunton). “All we really need is to
hold people responsible for their bad actions.”
Hefner, the 32-year-old husband of disgraced
former Senate President Rosenberg, will face his
last pre-trial hearing Tuesday before his Sept.
11 trial on assault and battery charges. Two men
allege that Hefner sexually harassed and
assaulted them, sometimes only feet away from
Rosenberg.
The Senate hired the law firm Hogan Lovells in
2017 to investigate whether Rosenberg broke any
rules related to the alleged misconduct. The
resulting report, released in April 2018, found
that Rosenberg gave Hefner too much access to
his Senate affairs and said he knew or should
have known about Hefner’s alleged inappropriate
behavior. Rosenberg stepped down after the
report was released.
The Senate has paid the firm a total of $311,000
for its investigation and consulting, with
payments continuing until December 2018,
according to the state comptroller’s records.
Speaker DeLeo, meanwhile, paid legal counsel as
recently as May in connection with his extensive
#MeToo overhaul. DeLeo OK’d $240,000 to law
firms Krokidas & Bluestein LLP and Foley Hoag
for a report reviewing his human resource
policies back in March 2018.
The report suggested the creation of an “Equal
Employment Opportunity Officer” to investigate
all sexual assault charges, and hiring a new
Human Resource director. The House made
additional payments to lawyers to help with that
hiring process, said DeLeo spokeswoman Catherine
Williams.
“One of the major issues that the House
encountered was with the timely appointment of
key personnel — including the HR Director and
the EEO Officer,” said Williams. “The House’s HR
Director was appointed in January 2019 and the
EEO Officer was appointed in April of 2019.”
Speaker DeLeo chose not to abolish nondisclosure
agreements, however, despite arguments they
shield offenders and keep victims silent.
State Rep. Colleen Garry (D-Dracut) said she
believes DeLeo’s policies will withstand any
renewed scrutiny that may emerge because of
Hefner’s trial.
“We’ve taken the issue of sexual harassment very
seriously and I think we’ve made a lot of
changes,” said Garry.
The Boston
Herald
Thursday, August 29, 2019
A Boston Herald editorial
Taxpayer-funded legal fees are an abomination
Citizens cover costs of sexual harassment
scandals
It should be called the sexual harassment tax.
It’s paid by every taxpayer in the Commonwealth
and it’s the money we are being required to
invest in trying to make sure our elected
officials don’t sexually assault the citizens or
each other.
As the Herald’s Hillary Chabot reported, Senate
President Karen Spilka and House Speaker Robert
DeLeo have spent more than $500,000 on outside
counsel since 2017.
It is hubris of the highest order and largely
bureaucratic wheel-spinning.
“Whenever something scandalous happens in
government, we pay for a study and suddenly
someone new is hired,” said state Rep. Shaunna
O’Connell (R-Taunton). “All we really need is to
hold people responsible for their bad actions.”
It seems obvious to most of us, but that kind of
thinking is out of favor on Beacon Hill, where
accountability is a mythical concept and
transparency reserved for the poor slobs who
weren’t lucky enough to serve in the legislature
— a body exempt from public records laws.
For an example of this process playing out,
taxpayers need look no further than the sex
assault trial of former Senate President Stanley
Rosenberg’s husband Bryon Hefner, which begins
next month. Hefner will walk into court on Sept
11 and face assault and battery charges. Two men
allege that Hefner sexually harassed and
assaulted them, sometimes only feet away from
Rosenberg.
The Senate hired the law firm Hogan Lovells in
2017, paying them an eye-popping total of
$311,000 to investigate whether Rosenberg broke
any rules related to the alleged misconduct.
When the report was released in April 2018, it
was confirmed that Rosenberg gave Hefner too
much access to his Senate affairs and that he
knew or should have known about Hefner’s alleged
inappropriate behavior.
Surprise, surprise. Rosenberg finally stepped
down after the report came out. He could easily
have saved the Commonwealth hundreds of
thousands of dollars in investigations and
months of his own ample salary by doing the
right thing and resigning from the start.
In the meantime, the Massachusetts House is
racking up its own hefty legal bills trying to
figure out how not to sexually harass people,
something we lowly citizens have to navigate on
our own.
Speaker DeLeo paid legal counsel as recently as
May in connection with his extensive #MeToo
human resources overhaul. DeLeo OK’d $240,000 to
law firms Krokidas & Bluestein LLP and Foley
Hoag for a report reviewing his human resource
policies back in March 2018.
Unsurprisingly, the report found more legal
services DeLeo could have the taxpayers cover,
suggesting the creation of an “Equal Employment
Opportunity Officer” to investigate all sexual
assault charges, and the hiring of a Human
Resource director. The House made additional
payments to lawyers to help with that hiring
process, DeLeo spokeswoman Catherine Williams
said.
Speaker DeLeo chose not to abolish nondisclosure
agreements, however, despite arguments they
shield offenders and keep victims silent.
State Rep. Colleen Garry (D-Dracut) said she
believes DeLeo’s policies will withstand any
renewed scrutiny that may emerge because of
Hefner’s trial.
“We’ve taken the issue of sexual harassment very
seriously and I think we’ve made a lot of
changes,” Garry said.
It remains to be seen whether the policies in
place actually work to reduce sexual harassment
and assault in the halls of state government.
But firing and voting out the obvious offenders
is also an effective solution, and would
certainly be cheaper.
State House News
Service
Friday, August 30, 2019
Weekly Roundup - Goodbye August
By Katie Lannan
Sitting in front of a room full of people in two
different shades of orange -- one on Gun Owners
Action League baseball caps, the other on End
Gun Violence T-shirts -- Rep. David Linsky
compared receiving a firearms permit without
first having to shoot a gun to earning a
driver's license without ever getting behind the
wheel.
By way of a rejoinder later on in Wednesday's
Public Safety Committee hearing, GOAL head Jim
Wallace contrasted the number of people who went
to the emergency room for a firearm-related
injury in 2015 (166) with those who visited
after a motor vehicle accident (73,000, he
said).
"So please, don't regulate guns like cars,"
Wallace said. "And I often joke that when you
come to one of our shooting ranges, and you see
a sign that says 'No texting and shooting,' then
you can come talk to us about firearm safety."
With only a couple days passed since that
hearing, it will likely be a while still until
the committee decides what additional gun
regulations it might pursue. So in the meantime,
how are things looking on the regulating-cars
front?
The House-Senate stalemate over distracted
driving legislation is now another week staler.
Advocates hoped dramatic footage of a
texting-while-driving crash in Berlin would help
spur lawmakers to reach a deal to ban the use of
handheld devices by drivers. But nothing
happened on that front this week....
September, when it arrives, will bring more
activity on Beacon Hill, though signs of
activity are gradually reappearing in the
marbled halls and stuffy hearing rooms of the
State House.
The Public Safety Committee's gun hearing was
the first committee hearing since July 30, and
the Transportation Committee this week sketched
out a fall agenda that features hearings on
driver's licenses for undocumented immigrants
and a transportation borrowing bill Baker filed
July 25....
As far as what those ideas and approaches might
be, add it to the list of pending questions to
be answered --at some point -- once Labor Day's
in the rearview mirror.
A few more bullet points on that list: When will
we see a school finance reform bill? What's the
House's plan for new transportation revenue?
What caused that infamous June Red Line
derailment? Who's Baker backing for president in
2020?
Just kidding on that last one -- as the governor
reminded reporters this week, he's got eyes only
for his day job and isn't interested in wading
into that particular fray.
The Boston
Globe
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
Chasm between Baker, state GOP grows as
lucrative fund-raising operation is dismantled
By Matt Stout
In a sign of the widening rift between Governor
Charlie Baker and the state GOP, party officials
have quietly dismantled the lucrative — and
controversial — fund-raising operation that
helped pump millions toward the second-term
Republican’s two campaign victories.
The Massachusetts Victory Committee, a joint
effort the MassGOP launched with the Republican
National Committee in 2013, has collapsed in
recent months, taking in next to no cash after
raising $11 million over the previous five
years.
Jim Lyons, a conservative former lawmaker
elected as party chairman in January, has also
scuttled the state GOP’s longtime fund-raisers,
and he has questioned spending at both
MassVictory and the party under Baker allies.
The moves, some in and around the party fear,
could sap the long cash-strapped GOP of badly
needed resources at a time when the fractures
between Lyons, a President Trump supporter, and
the more moderate Baker, a Trump critic, have
never appeared wider.
“It’s clear that a successful fund-raising
operation is not a priority of current MassGOP
leadership,” John Cook, the finance chairman of
MassVictory since 2015, wrote Monday in a
scathing e-mail to state’s 80 GOP committee
members. The MassVictory committee “has been
closed down” — suggesting it was Lyons’ decision
— and party fund-raising has badly lagged since,
Cook added.
“Our GOP candidates up and down the ballot in
2020 are unlikely to receive any direct
financial support from the party, and the vital
programs the MassGOP pioneered over the past
five years are at risk of being mothballed,” he
said.
Lyons declined to respond to Cook’s e-mail,
saying he’d wait to comment until after he met
with an internal committee investigating the
party’s spending. Lyons caught the attention of
committee members when he circulated on Friday
night a five-page memo scrutinizing hundreds of
thousands in payments the party and MassVictory
had made over multiple years to Cook and others.
But, in an earlier interview, Lyons downplayed
the impact of losing MassVictory’s fund-raising
stream, saying he feels “comfortable” the party
is raising enough to help candidates in 2020 and
that it’s exploring other opportunities to
partner with the national committee.
“There’s a transition taking place,” Lyons said.
“Based on our close relationship with the RNC,
we believe in the long term, it will be
beneficial to the party.”
According to the memo from Lyons’s team, he was
told by Cook that the agreement between the
MassGOP and Republican National Committee had
“expired” before his election and needed his
approval to be renewed.
In the months following Lyons’ election, the
committee grounded to a halt, reporting just a
single, $1,000 donation through the end of July.
In 2018 alone, the committee had funneled nearly
$1.4 million into the party’s federal account.
Under the complicated agreement, portions of
MassVictory’s fund-raising went to both the
MassGOP and the RNC. But the national committee
would also routinely transfer lump-sum payments
to the state party, which in 2018 alone mounted
to $1.6 million.
The arrangement allowed individual donors to
give up to $45,500 to MassVictory, far above the
$5,000 cap for state-regulated political
donations to the parties or the $1,000 annual
limit for donations to Baker’s campaign
committee.
MassVictory also had survived intense scrutiny.
State campaign finance regulators determined in
2016 that the state party’s use of money raised
under federal rules to help Baker slipped
through a loophole in Massachusetts campaign
finance law. And repeated attempts by Democrats
who control the Legislature to rein in the
fund-raising structure never gained traction.
Now sapped of MassVictory’s fund-raising stream,
the state party’s federal account has raised
roughly $470,000 through the end of July, with
more than half of that — more than $270,000 —
coming directly from its own state-level
account.
RNC officials did not return repeated calls and
e-mails about the fund-raising agreement. Jim
Conroy, a senior adviser to Baker, declined to
comment.
The developments, however, have left others
openly questioning the direction of the party.
Cook, who led fund-raising for the MassGOP
before joining MassVictory, said the party is on
pace for its “worst year of fund-raising since
2009” and has done little to replace the
advantage that committee gave the party.
“The Chair didn’t coordinate fundraising with
the Baker and Polito teams. And the Chair chose
not to preserve the fundraising structure
previously in place,” Cook wrote in his e-mail
to committee members. “The professional finance
staff that raised $15 million [over the last
four years] is no longer employed by the MassGOP.”
Brent J. Andersen, the longtime party treasurer
who unsuccessfully vied against Lyons for
chairman this year, said that after nearly 20
years on the state committee, he will not seek
reelection in March. “Lyons and his leadership
team have taken actions that will have
pernicious effects,” Andersen said in an e-mail
to The Boston Globe.
Fissures have been forming for months between
the Lyons-led party and Baker, its titular head.
Under the former Andover lawmaker, the state GOP
has adopted a pro-Trump tone far to the right of
Baker’s more moderate brand, and Baker has
retained his own staff as he mulls seeking a
third term. The governor had used party
employees and the MassGOP headquarters for its
operations after he first took office in 2015,
helping cover overhead costs as Baker raised
record-breaking amounts.
Baker’s political team is also now renting a
$3,000-a-month office on West Street, providing
a physical example of the separation between the
governor and the party apparatus.
Then, in August, the divide spilled directly in
the public realm when the two sides clashed over
lucrative donor databases that temporarily
locked both out of the data by software giant
Salesforce.com.
The party staff has since regained access to the
database, according to a letter its lawyer sent
Lyons roughly two weeks after they threatened
legal action against the company.
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