For Immediate Release
Contact: Chip Ford, Executive Director
Citizens for Limited
Taxation joins with multi-state coalition of Transportation and Climate
Initiative (TCI) opponents in calling for the rejection of TCI.
Adoption by Governor Baker would impose a cruel economic hardship on
motorists, businesses, and consumers on top of the economic crisis
created by pandemic lockdowns.
The TCI opposition
coalition today has issued a
release detailing its opposition.
TCI is an already
failed concept. Of the dozen New England and Mid-Atlantic states and
Washington, D.C. which initially considered this regional tax on gas and
diesel fuels for over a year, only three small New England states
(Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut) and Washington, D.C.
ultimately signed on to the final Memo of Understanding.
At that time, a State
House News Service report reminded us:
"A year ago, [Secretary
of Energy and Environmental Affairs] Theoharides said the TCI coalition
had not examined how many states it would take to make a regional pact
work, but said that a 'critical mass' of participation from the original
12 states and the District of Columbia would be necessary to make TCI
successful.
"On Monday, she said
having Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut and Washington, D.C.,
onboard represented enough of a critical mass and that the TCI program
'can absolutely be effective with three states and the District of
Columbia.'"
CLT executive director
Chip Ford said, "Three small New England states out of a dozen does not
reach any sort of 'critical mass' no matter how much you stretch and
contort the definition."
The imposition of any
tax, by any name or disguise, to be legitimate needs to be adopted only
by a vote of the elected representatives of the people, not unilaterally
imposed by the fiat of one person.
Ford added, "One-person
rule is defined as a monarchy at best and even under such, just because
a monarch can doesn't mean a monarch should."
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