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CLT UPDATE
Wednesday, January 29, 2020

Call your State Rep & Senator or start packing

Jump directly to CLT's Commentary on the News


On January 23rd 2020, the Massachusetts Senate came out with a Climate Change package that would drastically increase regulations on how you live your daily life. The senate is seeking to tax you on necessities such as driving your car and heating your home, and simply raise prices on EVERYTHING! This package includes three separate bills and is going to be taken up by the Senate on THURSDAY ...

Please contact your legislators and tell them this extreme nanny-state legislation is insulting to taxpayers and reaches far beyond what is appropriate.

MassFiscal
California Style Regulations in Massachusetts!


For a Republican governor, Charlie Baker is all in on fighting climate change, and now it’s up to his Environmental Secretary Katie Theoharides to do the fighting.

Already she’s facing headwinds on the Transportation and Climate Initiative, as other New England governors cast doubt, or, in the case of New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu, have become outright hostile toward the proposal.

But no one should underestimate Theoharides and Baker’s resolve to get buy-in on the ambitious, multistate program that aims to cap fossil fuel use by vehicles and in the process increase the cost of filling up at the gas pump by as much as 17 cents per gallon.

“She has great analytical and political skills,” said Ken Kimmell, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, the Cambridge environmental advocacy group. “If anyone can pull it off, I think she can, especially since she is getting huge help from her boss, the governor.”

Even with Baker’s unequivocal support, Theoharides knew getting others on board would be hard. She faces a spring deadline to get states in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region to agree on meaningful limits on emissions.

“States are going to be in somewhat different places politically,” acknowledged Theoharides, who also serves as chair of the coalition of a dozen states looking at implementing TCI. “People hate any time we are looking at things that affect the price of gas.” ...

While a recent MassINC poll indicates broad support for TCI among voters in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, the politics are difficult even in Massachusetts. Senate President Karen Spilka supports TCI, but Speaker Bob DeLeo is actively mapping out other ways to raise additional money to fix the state’s crumbling transportation infrastructure.

Raising the gas tax, for example, could complicate the state’s pursuit of TCI.

“It would be very difficult to get both approved at the same time,” said Theoharides. “I worry if we try to do both at the same time we don’t get TCI.” ...

Theoharides said she has made TCI her top priority, taking up nearly a third of her time. She has dug deep because Baker has too. Last week during his State of the Commonwealth address he committed the state toward net-zero emissions by 2050.

“Net-zero hinges on us doing something large-scale like TCI,” said Theoharides.

The Boston Globe
Tuesday, January 28, 2020
Her assignment from Baker: Save the environment


One group of lawmakers suggested tolls at the state’s border. Others want a dedicated revenue stream for regional transit hubs. Some simply asked that their towns not be forgotten.

As Massachusetts House leaders shape the details of a long-awaited transportation financing bill, they have spent weeks systematically meeting behind closed doors with the caucuses and delegations that make up the chamber’s membership, asking for input on a bill that could raise hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes or fees.

The approach is an unusual and painstaking one that, legislative leaders hope, will solicit ideas and help build consensus for a bill that would separate residents from more of their money — no small task in an election year. It’s also made something else clear: Lawmakers’ wish list for any new money is a lengthy one.

“Everyone needs to see that their constituency is in the bill,” said state Representative Michael J. Moran, a Brighton Democrat who sits on House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo’s leadership team and met with the bill’s architects as part of Boston’s delegation. “It’s always complicated when you have bills like that. And it’s always expensive.”

The exercise — led by Representative Aaron Michlewitz, the House budget chairman, and Representative William M. Straus, chairman of the transportation committee — underscores the difficult task facing the Legislature....

DeLeo said Monday that any overarching price tag on the bill still “varies," and Moran, who serves as a second assistant majority leader under the Winthrop Democrat, said House leadership has yet to present members with definitive language. But Moran said his “instinct” is the bill will ultimately total roughly $700 million in revenue, which he acknowledged may not satisfy everyone.

“But the last big tax vote I took was repealed,” Moran said, referencing a 2013 law that, in part, tied the state’s gas tax to inflation. Voters the next year struck down the provision at the ballot box, a development that still colors some lawmakers’ thinking this time.

“Everyone is [saying] just, ‘Raise revenue,’” Moran said. “That’s great. We did that — and then the voters said, ‘No thank you.’”

The Boston Globe
Monday, January 27, 2019
‘I’ve never participated in a meeting like that’:
Inside the House’s great transportation debate
Leaders walk tightrope as they consider huge increase in taxes or fees.


A poll of Massachusetts voters taken this month showed support for Massachusetts joining a regional effort to cut emissions in the transportation sector, but opposition to a 17-cent-per-gallon increase in gas prices that the compact could cause.

The poll of 712 likely voters, conducted for the Fiscal Alliance Foundation, asked respondents about Massachusetts joining the Transportation Climate Initiative, describing it as a regional collaboration of 11 states "that seek to improve transportation and reduce carbon emissions from the transportation sector by increasing the costs of gasoline and diesel fuel." More than 46 percent of respondents expressed support, with 41 percent against and 12.5 percent undecided.

The compact's architects say it could lead to gas price increases of between 5 cents a gallon and 17 cents per gallon.

Pollsters asked respondents about Massachusetts joining TCI if it meant paying an additional tax or fee on gas and diesel vehicle fuel of up to 17 cents per gallon in the first year, and increasing annually. More than 60 percent of respondents expressed opposition to that scenario, with just over 31 percent in support and 8.7 percent with no opinion.

State House News Service
Tuesday, January 28, 2020
Poll: Gas Price Considerations Influence TCI Support


Chip Ford's CLT Commentary

On top of the controversial Transportation Climate Initiative (TCI) that, if imposed, intends to add up to 17 cents to the cost of a gallon of gas for a start, with future increases as determined by some unaccountable bureaucracy from out-of-state without a vote of our representatives, the state Senate has proposed three additional "climate change" related bills that would cripple Massachusetts residents:  S-2476, S-2477, and S-2478.   If adopted, they would cost every resident of Massachusetts a small fortune, even a large one for some.

As our ally in the multi-state anti-TCI coalition, Mass. Fiscal Alliance, warned in its release below, "The Senate is seeking to tax you on necessities such as driving your car and heating your home, and simply raise prices on EVERYTHING!"

The Legislature has gone wild, using this threat of "climate change" as a cudgel to batter taxpayers into submission, to price every productive resident into poverty, drive them out of Massachusetts if they are to survive.

As you must be aware, CLT is you and all its members.  When CLT has won tax cut ballot campaigns it was because you and other members collected the signatures to put the question on the ballot, supported our efforts and ballot campaigns.  CLT represents your interests and keeps you informed but you must stand up as a citizen and make your voice heard.  Legislators must hear from you personally their constituent if they are to be held accountable, or feel they will be.  They are certainly hearing from those fanatics who want to price you into oblivion as mere collateral damage in their holy crusade.  If legislators don't hear countering voices, who do you suppose they will listen to?  What do you suppose legislators will do?

Please contact your state senator and state representative and urge them to abandon the plans to bankrupt you, or drive you out of Massachusetts for your and your family's financial survival.

FIND YOUR STATE SENATOR AND REPRESENTATIVE HERE

Back on December 11 the State House News Service reported the results of a MassINC poll on support of TCI.  It reported:

A MassINC poll published Wednesday found that a majority of registered voters in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Virginia strongly or somewhat support their home state's participation in the Transportation and Climate Initiative.

In Massachusetts, 68 percent of the 629 respondents said they support the program, compared to 21 percent who oppose it and 11 percent who are unsure, according to the poll, which was sponsored by the Barr Foundation....

...The poll's question did not reference the potential of higher costs on motorists when asking about their support for the program.

That important detail of "higher costs on motorists" was not included, strangely.

Well it's been included in a new poll recently released by Fiscal Alliance Foundation and when asked, support fell dramatically, the State House News Service reported, in fact it almost inverted:

Pollsters asked respondents about Massachusetts joining TCI if it meant paying an additional tax or fee on gas and diesel vehicle fuel of up to 17 cents per gallon in the first year, and increasing annually.  More than 60 percent of respondents expressed opposition to that scenario, with just over 31 percent in support and 8.7 percent with no opinion.

S-2476 — An Act to Accelerate the Transition of Cars, Trucks, and Buses to Carbon-Free Power

S-2477 — An Act Setting Next-Generation Climate Policy

S-2478 — An Act Relative to Energy Savings Efficiency (Energy Save)

How do you suppose those above three Senate bills — in addition to an ever-growing burden imposed by TCI will poll when and if their additional crushing costs are ever exposed?

Please call your state representative and state senator immediately — or forever hold your peace, and start packing up for the move out of Massachusetts.

Chip Ford
Executive Director


 

MassFiscal
California Style Regulations in Massachusetts!


On January 23rd 2020, the Massachusetts Senate came out with a Climate Change package that would drastically increase regulations on how you live your daily life.  The senate is seeking to tax you on necessities such as driving your car and heating your home, and simply raise prices on EVERYTHING!  This package includes three separate bills and is going to be taken up by the Senate on THURSDAY:

(S 2476) continues taxpayer-funded subsidies for electric vehicles (EV’s,) increases the requirement for EV charging stations in parking lots with more than 10 spaces as well as all commercial and residential lots.  It will also require all taxpayer-funded state vehicles to change to expensive zero emissions vehicles by certain dates.

(S 2477) is a straight Carbon Tax that will increase the cost of living exponentially.  It establishes net-neutral greenhouse gas emissions standards by 2050.  It accomplishes this by adopting sector-based statewide greenhouse gas emissions sub-limits including, but not limited to, electric power, transportation, commercial and industrial heating and cooling, residential heating and cooling, industrial processes, solid waste, agriculture and natural gas distribution and service.  This simply means you will pay more for electricity, gas, heat in the winter and air conditioning in the summer, trash disposal, food, and any other goods and services that uses any of these things to be made for you or to get to you.

(S 2478) Substantially expands the Massachusetts Appliance Efficiency Standards Act to include higher standards for a wider variety of consumer and commercial products. What will it do?

• It requires cooking appliances, air ventilation systems, and lamps to meet federal Energy Star guidelines;

• It adopts California energy regulations for computers and computer monitors;

• It establishes specific flow volumes required for plumbing fixtures, including shower heads, faucets, toilets, and urinals;

• It sets an effective date of January 1, 2022, after which products covered in this act must meet their new regulations in order to be sold or installed in Massachusetts;

• Maintains existing federal water and energy efficiency requirements in Massachusetts in the event they are withdrawn or repealed.

Please contact your legislators and tell them this extreme nanny-state legislation is insulting to taxpayers and reaches far beyond what is appropriate.

https://www.votervoice.net/MASSFISCAL/Campaigns/70606/Respond


The Boston Globe
Tuesday, January 28, 2020

Her assignment from Baker: Save the environment
By Shirley Leung


For a Republican governor, Charlie Baker is all in on fighting climate change, and now it’s up to his Environmental Secretary Katie Theoharides to do the fighting.

Already she’s facing headwinds on the Transportation and Climate Initiative, as other New England governors cast doubt, or, in the case of New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu, have become outright hostile toward the proposal.

But no one should underestimate Theoharides and Baker’s resolve to get buy-in on the ambitious, multistate program that aims to cap fossil fuel use by vehicles and in the process increase the cost of filling up at the gas pump by as much as 17 cents per gallon.

“She has great analytical and political skills,” said Ken Kimmell, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, the Cambridge environmental advocacy group. “If anyone can pull it off, I think she can, especially since she is getting huge help from her boss, the governor.”

Even with Baker’s unequivocal support, Theoharides knew getting others on board would be hard. She faces a spring deadline to get states in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region to agree on meaningful limits on emissions.

“States are going to be in somewhat different places politically,” acknowledged Theoharides, who also serves as chair of the coalition of a dozen states looking at implementing TCI. “People hate any time we are looking at things that affect the price of gas.”

For those keeping score in New England, only Rhode Island Governor Gina Raimondo is publicly enthusiastic, with her office reiterating this week that she is “fully committed” to the goals of TCI and an “aggressive approach” to lowering carbon emissions.

Theoharides is hesitant to say how many states need to commit before the program begins in 2022, but obviously the more the better. “Really our goal now is to get as many as we can,” she said.

TCI aims to reduce vehicle emissions, which account for 40 percent of climate-changing greenhouse gas pollution. Under TCI, fuel distributors in participating states would need to buy pollution permits for the carbon dioxide they produce.

States could then take the money generated from the permits — estimated to be in the billions of dollars — and invest them in public transit and an alternative fuel infrastructure that would, for example, motivate consumers to switch to electric vehicles.

Gas prices are likely to rise because it is widely expected that fuel distributors will pass their additional costs onto consumers.

While TCI may seem like it came out of nowhere, Massachusetts officials across different administrations have been working with other states for a decade on reducing transportation emissions. States began to coalesce around a TCI concept in 2017, and that’s when Theoharides got involved in her prior role as the state’s director of climate and global warming solutions. Baker promoted 37-year-old Theoharides, who is trained as a field biologist, to the top environmental job in May when Matthew Beaton left for the private sector.

If Theoharides seems unfazed by the resistance to TCI, it’s because environmentalists pushing for transformative change have been here before. TCI is modeled off the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a multistate, cap-and-invest system that is viewed as a national model for sharply reducing power plant emissions without raising electricity rates.

But it was far from sure thing in 2003, when governors from nine states in the Northeast began deliberating RGGI. The proposed compact had its share of naysayers and critics: Would it increase the price of electricity? Could it hurt the reliability of power? Would a cap-and-invest program even work?

When it came time to sign RGGI’s first memorandum of understanding in 2005, the Republican governors of Massachusetts and Rhode Island at the time (Mitt Romney and Donald Carcieri) got cold feet and refused to participate.

Two years later, Carcieri had a change of heart and Rhode Island joined RGGI, as did Massachusetts under then Governor Deval Patrick. Maryland also signed up at the time.

Martin Suuberg, commissioner of the Massachusetts Department for Environmental Protection and the current chairman of RGGI, said TCI advocates are also drawing lessons on how to reach consensus, such as having a transparent process and collaborating closely with counterparts in other states.

“A lot of the states that are in TCI also did RGGI. It was an important template. We tried to incorporate a lot of the elements,” said Suuberg, while “recognizing that everyone would bring their own perspective.”

While a recent MassINC poll indicates broad support for TCI among voters in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, the politics are difficult even in Massachusetts. Senate President Karen Spilka supports TCI, but Speaker Bob DeLeo is actively mapping out other ways to raise additional money to fix the state’s crumbling transportation infrastructure.

Raising the gas tax, for example, could complicate the state’s pursuit of TCI.

“It would be very difficult to get both approved at the same time,” said Theoharides. “I worry if we try to do both at the same time we don’t get TCI.”

It’s hard to see a scenario in which Beacon Hill signs off on what would be a double-whammy at the gas pump. But here’s the case for TCI: Designed right, the program can break us out of our dependence on fossil fuels. A gas tax is just a gas tax. If you believe climate change is an urgent problem, you get behind TCI, which across multiple states affects the habits of 70 million people and 52 million vehicles.

Theoharides said she has made TCI her top priority, taking up nearly a third of her time. She has dug deep because Baker has too. Last week during his State of the Commonwealth address he committed the state toward net-zero emissions by 2050.

“Net-zero hinges on us doing something large-scale like TCI,” said Theoharides.

Of Baker’s big bet on TCI, Theoharides added: “It’s not an easy thing for him to lead on ... He is personally sticking his neck out on this. I feel a real obligation to keep as many states in as we can and to make it a success."


The Boston Globe
Monday, January 27, 2019

‘I’ve never participated in a meeting like that’:
Inside the House’s great transportation debate
Leaders walk tightrope as they consider huge increase in taxes or fees.
By Matt Stout


One group of lawmakers suggested tolls at the state’s border. Others want a dedicated revenue stream for regional transit hubs. Some simply asked that their towns not be forgotten.

As Massachusetts House leaders shape the details of a long-awaited transportation financing bill, they have spent weeks systematically meeting behind closed doors with the caucuses and delegations that make up the chamber’s membership, asking for input on a bill that could raise hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes or fees.

The approach is an unusual and painstaking one that, legislative leaders hope, will solicit ideas and help build consensus for a bill that would separate residents from more of their money — no small task in an election year. It’s also made something else clear: Lawmakers’ wish list for any new money is a lengthy one.

“Everyone needs to see that their constituency is in the bill,” said state Representative Michael J. Moran, a Brighton Democrat who sits on House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo’s leadership team and met with the bill’s architects as part of Boston’s delegation. “It’s always complicated when you have bills like that. And it’s always expensive.”

The exercise — led by Representative Aaron Michlewitz, the House budget chairman, and Representative William M. Straus, chairman of the transportation committee — underscores the difficult task facing the Legislature.

Just about everyone inside and outside the State House agrees the state’s transportation networks have lurched into crisis, with jam-packed highways, deteriorating roads, and problem-plagued trains providing a daily reminder of the state’s transit troubles. But the amount of new money needed, and where to best funnel it, is an open debate, as is perhaps the stickier question: How should lawmakers actually raise it?

Nearly a year ago, DeLeo publicly asked for input from business leaders, who want action but did not overwhelmingly coalesce around how to raise revenue. Various advocates have pressed their case, fanning out polls and reports with recommendations. Reams of bills offer no shortage of ideas.

Some have appeared to gain traction. Straus has long said generating enough money in the bill would be difficult without raising the state’s 24-cents-a-gallon gas tax. And DeLeo said last week that hiking the fees applied to Uber or Lyft rides was “actively being considered” after Governor Charlie Baker included the idea in his budget proposal.

But even now, lawmakers say the legislation’s full scope, as well as its exact timing this winter, remains a work-in-progress. So after DeLeo opted to push into 2020 a debate he originally targeted for last fall, Michlewitz and Straus began January by huddling with groups of lawmakers who share geography or ideology to gather feedback.

It set off a relatively unorthodox process in a chamber that can often lean on siloed committees to produce legislation and the speaker’s office for direction.

“I’ve never participated in a meeting like that in my time in the building,” said Representative Carolyn C. Dykema, a Holliston Democrat who joined the House in 2009 and chairs the Legislature’s MetroWest caucus.

The meetings, held in Michlewitz’s second-floor office, can last for an hour, if not more. There’s been roughly 10 so far, with more scheduled for this week, and have featured groups ranging from the chamber’s nearly 60-person Progressive Caucus to the Massachusetts Black and Latino Caucus to lawmakers who represent so-called Gateway Cities.

“When we set out, there are caucuses among colleagues that I wasn’t even aware of,” Straus said. “I think it’s been an education for everyone.”

It’s also produced ideas aplenty. Members of the MetroWest caucus, whose towns use the commuter rail as a vital link to the city, laid out concerns over unreliable trains and the impact of major construction projects, including the expansive viaduct project in Allston.

But Dykema said members also view the bill as a chance to expand tolling beyond the Massachusetts Turnpike, on which many of their constituents also rely to get to and from work. “I think the vast majority of us [in the caucus] would welcome tolls at the border or tolled lanes on additional roadways,” she said.

The House Progressive Caucus, meanwhile, said a focus should also be on generating economic development in low-income communities or the “decarbonization of all modes of transportation” — with the brunt of any tax increases falling on businesses.

“We believe that the greater part of new transportation-related revenue should be collected through corporate taxes,” Representatives Tricia Farley-Bouvier and Jack Patrick Lewis, the caucus co-chairs, said in a statement.

The Legislature’s Regional Transit Authority Caucus, a collection of lawmakers who represent towns and cities served by the 15 RTA’s that provide local bus service, pressed for a dedicated state funding source for those agencies outside any annual budget allocation.

At the moment, only the MBTA has one, an automatic portion of the state’s sales tax receipts. Any type of new revenue stream for the RTA’s can help pay for night or weekend service in places they don’t have it, lawmakers argued.

“That was the ask,” said Representative Sarah K. Peake, a Provincetown Democrat who co-chairs the caucus and sits on DeLeo’s leadership team. “Everything is on the table and as long as we get our fair share, we’re going to feel OK about it.”

Representative Paul W. Mark, a Peru Democrat who co-chairs the Rural Caucus, said its meeting delved into discussion about closing corporate tax loopholes to help offset any potential increase to the gas tax that could pinch places, like his 850-person town 12 miles east of Pittsfield, that don’t have public transit options.

“When we talk about transportation funding, it all ends up going to the MBTA, or it all ends up going to the Boston area,” Mark said. “If we’re going to do this thing, we want to make sure that rural towns, regardless of location, aren’t forgotten."

DeLeo said Monday that any overarching price tag on the bill still “varies," and Moran, who serves as a second assistant majority leader under the Winthrop Democrat, said House leadership has yet to present members with definitive language. But Moran said his “instinct” is the bill will ultimately total roughly $700 million in revenue, which he acknowledged may not satisfy everyone.

“But the last big tax vote I took was repealed,” Moran said, referencing a 2013 law that, in part, tied the state’s gas tax to inflation. Voters the next year struck down the provision at the ballot box, a development that still colors some lawmakers’ thinking this time.

“Everyone is [saying] just, ‘Raise revenue,’ ” Moran said. “That’s great. We did that — and then the voters said, ‘No thank you.’”


State House News Service
Tuesday, January 28, 2020

Poll: Gas Price Considerations Influence TCI Support
By Michael P. Norton

A poll of Massachusetts voters taken this month showed support for Massachusetts joining a regional effort to cut emissions in the transportation sector, but opposition to a 17-cent-per-gallon increase in gas prices that the compact could cause.

The poll of 712 likely voters, conducted for the Fiscal Alliance Foundation, asked respondents about Massachusetts joining the Transportation Climate Initiative, describing it as a regional collaboration of 11 states "that seek to improve transportation and reduce carbon emissions from the transportation sector by increasing the costs of gasoline and diesel fuel." More than 46 percent of respondents expressed support, with 41 percent against and 12.5 percent undecided.

The compact's architects say it could lead to gas price increases of between 5 cents a gallon and 17 cents per gallon.

Pollsters asked respondents about Massachusetts joining TCI if it meant paying an additional tax or fee on gas and diesel vehicle fuel of up to 17 cents per gallon in the first year, and increasing annually. More than 60 percent of respondents expressed opposition to that scenario, with just over 31 percent in support and 8.7 percent with no opinion.

Officials in neighboring New England States have expressed reservations about joining the compact, and poll respondents by a 61 percent to 27 percent margin opposed Massachusetts joining TCI if neighboring states were not participating.

The poll, conducted by Jim Eltringham of Advantage Inc., featured a margin of error of plus or minus 3.7 percent.

Online: Full Poll Results

 

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml


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