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Post Office Box 1147
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Marblehead, Massachusetts 01945
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“Every Tax is a Pay Cut ... A Tax Cut is a Pay Raise”
48 years as “The Voice of Massachusetts Taxpayers”
— and
their Institutional Memory — |
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CLT UPDATE
Sunday, October 23, 2022
CLT's $3B Tax Cap
Refund Cometh!
Jump directly
to CLT's Commentary on the News
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Most Relevant News
Excerpts
(Full news reports follow Commentary)
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The Baker
administration took meaningful steps Friday towards
sending nearly $3 billion in excess state revenue
back to taxpayers, officially repealing the
regulation that governed how taxpayers obtained a
credit the only other time that Chapter 62F came
into play, in 1987, and releasing a technical
document spelling out exactly how the process will
work this year....
The Baker
administration told the New Service in August that
it got no public comments on its plan to repeal the
regulation (830 CMR 62F.6.1) stemming from the May
hearing.
The
regulation that was repealed described a process
under which a taxpayer "may claim an excess revenue
credit toward personal income tax liability for the
current taxable year equal to the taxpayer's
personal income tax liability for the previous
taxable year multiplied by the excess revenue
percentage."
But with
nearly $3 billion due back to taxpayers instead of
less than $30 million in 1987, Baker has said he
wants the money to go out as rebate checks in the
coming weeks rather than as a credit on next year's
taxes.
To that
end, DOR later on Friday also published a "technical
information release" that explains how the agency
plans to handle the excess revenue credit any time
that the auditor certifies that the state collected
more than the Chapter 62F cap allows. The document
makes clear that it begins with the "credits
required to be issued for the fiscal year ending
June 30, 2022."
First, DOR
will calculate the "excess revenue percentage" that
will be used to calculate the amount of a taxpayer's
excess revenue credit by "dividing the excess state
tax revenues determined by the State Auditor for the
previous fiscal year by the estimated total personal
income tax revenues received by the Commonwealth in
the current calendar year in payment of personal
income tax liabilities incurred for the previous
taxable year." DOR said that will happen after the
deadline to file an eligible return, which is
Monday.
Next, DOR
will multiply the liability as reported on a
taxpayer's personal income tax return (after being
reduced by any credits) by the "excess revenue
percentage" to calculate the taxpayer's excess
revenue credit amount.
"Where the
application of the excess revenue credit would
reduce a taxpayer's liability as reported on the
taxpayer's tax return filed for the previous year,
the Department will issue the amount of the
reduction to said liability as a refund. The excess
revenue credit cannot reduce a taxpayer's liability
for the previous taxable year to an amount less than
zero," DOR wrote in the document....
Monday
afternoon could reveal exactly where House Speaker
Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka
stand on Baker's latest plan: the so-called Big
Three is scheduled to meet privately -- and then
with the media -- at 12:30 p.m. in what has become a
rare leadership meeting.
State
House News Service
Monday, October 17, 2022
New Bulletin
Spells Out State’s Tax Relief Approach
Refunds Replace Credits Under Commissioner Snyder's
Plan
The
economic development bill was to include about $500
million in tax rebates, but neither Spilka nor
Mariano would commit Monday to passing the tax
relief plan they agreed to in July. Mariano called
the Chapter 62F tax relief "a good beginning" and
said the House and Senate would continue to
negotiate around their own plan....
Mariano
suggested Monday that he's not going to accommodate
serious consideration of a bill that Cambridge Rep.
Mike Connolly filed last week to change the way that
Chapter 62F money is distributed in order to cap
refunds for wealthier residents.
"The bill
is going to go through the process, it's going to be
admitted as a late-file. But it's a significant
change in the legislation that, you know, I would
like to see the full body be involved in the debate.
Right now we're in a lame duck session [and] there's
about 15 people that will be voting that won't be
here next year. So I think that that creates a bit
of a problem," Mariano said.
Asked if
the House would be more likely to tackle a bill like
that next session, the speaker responded, "If there
will be changes, I would think that would be the
logical place to do it."
State
House News Service
Monday, October 17, 2022
Dems Still Wrestling
With Economic Development Bill Basics
Spilka: Funding, Scope And Timing All Unresolved
Baker has
been clear he wants taxpayers to get their money
back as soon as possible, but exactly when residents
would see a check and how much it would be seemed
very up in the air before the start of the weekend.
Last week
a group of lawmakers submitted a bill which would
cap rebates under 62F at $6,500, or about how much a
person making $1 million in 2021 would be due back.
Previously, lawmakers had even hinted they may look
at doing away with 62F altogether and keeping the
tax excess to make up for a planned $4 billion in
economic development that passed both chambers of
the Legislature unanimously but was shelved after
lawmakers learned they would need to give $3 billion
back to residents.
On Monday,
House Speaker Ron Mariano, speaking alongside Baker
after one of their now-infrequent leadership
meetings, said the proposal to cap payments is a
late filed bill and would need to go through the
entire legislative process before it is considered,
indicating that the full amount due out under 62F —
a proportional payment based off how much you paid
in taxes — will not be capped.
“The bill
is going to go through the process, it’s going to be
admitted as a late-file. But it’s a significant
change in the legislation that, you know, I would
like to see the full body be involved in the debate.
Right now we’re in a lame duck session, there’s
about 15 people that will be voting that won’t be
here next year. I think that that creates a bit of a
problem,” Mariano said....
Baker
wasn’t certain when in November the Department of
Revenue would issue checks to taxpayers, but he said
his administration is actively working on the
problem.
“Our goal
is to have the DOR start to move those things out
sometime in November, but I can’t answer today
whether or not that’s all going to be done by the
end of the month or not,” he said. “I wish I could.”
The
Boston Herald
Monday, October 17, 2022
Money due to
taxpayers hopefully paid in November, Charlie Baker
says
House
Speaker Ronald Mariano said talks around the
Legislature's own tax relief plan would continue --
the plan announced July 7 called for checks to be
delivered by the end of September -- but also noted
that leaving tax relief and reform to the next
session (and implicitly the next governor) is
"always an option." Mariano's preferred candidate,
Democrat Maura Healey, has meanwhile been calling on
the Legislature to hurry up and pass the tax reforms
proposed by Republican Gov. Charlie Baker.
The
outgoing governor and both people vying to be his
successor agree on one thing: the nearly $3 billion
in excess state revenue that's due back to taxpayers
should go out under Baker, not the next governor.
That Chapter 62F money is expected to start flowing
next month.
But if
Democrats try to make changes to the tax cap law
that took them by surprise, Mariano said it would
almost certainly happen next session. The next
governor could have to decide whether to sign
legislation changing the law that voters put in
place in 1986. Some progressives are pushing for
changes to cap how much a wealthy taxpayer could get
back, but legislative leaders have previously
floated the idea that they could make broader
changes to a law they seem to have forgotten about.
And if
Question 1 passes on next month's ballot, the next
governor will be responsible (in their second year
in office) for proposing a state budget that taps
into the estimated $1.3 billion that the proposed
Constitutional amendment might raise via an income
surtax on wealthier residents. That money, if the
Legislature agrees to appropriate it at all, can
only be spent on education or transportation and
surtax supporters will be watching closely to make
sure Beacon Hill doesn't pull a bait-and-switch as
opponents warn.
State
House News Service
Friday, October 21, 2022
Weekly Roundup - To-Do List Looms
Beyond The Finish Line
. . . Also
in the area of high-level administration, Gov.
Charlie Baker's team has reached the late-October
period when it plans to finalize the percentage that
will determine the size of tax refunds under Chapter
62F. The administration is gearing up to get nearly
$3 billion in checks and direct deposits out next
month and preliminarily estimated that eligible
taxpayers will receive about 13 percent of their tax
year 2021 personal income tax liability.
State
House News Service
Friday, October 21, 2022
Advances - Week of Oct. 23, 2022 |
Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary |
|
The news this week
on CLT's $3 Billion Tax Cap refund is very
encouraging — it seems almost a
certainty at this point. Democratic Socialist state
Rep. Mike Connolly's and others'
obstruction and redistribution scheme apparently is going
nowhere — not for the next few
months anyway. It would appear though that our Tax Cap
excess revenue refund will likely prove to be fleeting
when the new Legislature reconvenes and is sworn in come January, so
appreciate this
victory while you can.
On Monday the State House News Service reported ("Dems
Still Wrestling With Economic Development Bill Basics
— Spilka: Funding, Scope And Timing All Unresolved"):
The economic development
bill was to include about $500 million in tax
rebates, but neither [Senate President Karen]
Spilka nor [House Speaker Ron] Mariano would
commit Monday to passing the tax relief plan
they agreed to in July. Mariano called the
Chapter 62F tax relief "a good beginning" and
said the House and Senate would continue to
negotiate around their own plan....
Mariano suggested Monday
that he's not going to accommodate serious
consideration of a bill that Cambridge Rep. Mike
Connolly filed last week to change the way that
Chapter 62F money is distributed in order to cap
refunds for wealthier residents.
"The bill is going to go
through the process, it's going to be admitted
as a late-file. But it's a significant change in
the legislation that, you know, I would like to
see the full body be involved in the debate.
Right now we're in a lame duck session [and]
there's about 15 people that will be voting that
won't be here next year. So I think that that
creates a bit of a problem," Mariano said.
Asked if the House would be
more likely to tackle a bill like that next
session, the speaker responded, "If there will
be changes, I would think that would be the
logical place to do it."
In a separate
report on Monday ("New
Bulletin Spells Out State’s Tax Relief Approach
— Refunds Replace Credits Under Commissioner Snyder's
Plan") the News Service reported how the Baker
administration orchestrated the refund and how it's expected
to play out:
The Baker administration
took meaningful steps Friday towards sending
nearly $3 billion in excess state revenue back
to taxpayers, officially repealing the
regulation that governed how taxpayers obtained
a credit the only other time that Chapter 62F
came into play, in 1987, and releasing a
technical document spelling out exactly how the
process will work this year....
The Baker administration
told the New Service in August that it got no
public comments on its plan to repeal the
regulation (830 CMR 62F.6.1) stemming from the
May hearing.
The regulation that was
repealed described a process under which a
taxpayer "may claim an excess revenue credit
toward personal income tax liability for the
current taxable year equal to the taxpayer's
personal income tax liability for the previous
taxable year multiplied by the excess revenue
percentage."
But with nearly $3 billion
due back to taxpayers instead of less than $30
million in 1987, Baker has said he wants the
money to go out as rebate checks in the coming
weeks rather than as a credit on next year's
taxes.
To that end, DOR later on
Friday also published a "technical information
release" that explains how the agency plans to
handle the excess revenue credit any time that
the auditor certifies that the state collected
more than the Chapter 62F cap allows. The
document makes clear that it begins with the
"credits required to be issued for the fiscal
year ending June 30, 2022."
First, DOR will calculate
the "excess revenue percentage" that will be
used to calculate the amount of a taxpayer's
excess revenue credit by "dividing the excess
state tax revenues determined by the State
Auditor for the previous fiscal year by the
estimated total personal income tax revenues
received by the Commonwealth in the current
calendar year in payment of personal income tax
liabilities incurred for the previous taxable
year." DOR said that will happen after the
deadline to file an eligible return, which is
Monday.
Next, DOR will multiply the
liability as reported on a taxpayer's personal
income tax return (after being reduced by any
credits) by the "excess revenue percentage" to
calculate the taxpayer's excess revenue credit
amount.
"Where the application of
the excess revenue credit would reduce a
taxpayer's liability as reported on the
taxpayer's tax return filed for the previous
year, the Department will issue the amount of
the reduction to said liability as a refund. The
excess revenue credit cannot reduce a taxpayer's
liability for the previous taxable year to an
amount less than zero," DOR wrote in the
document....
Monday afternoon could
reveal exactly where House Speaker Ronald
Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka stand
on Baker's latest plan: the so-called Big Three
is scheduled to meet privately -- and then with
the media -- at 12:30 p.m. in what has become a
rare leadership meeting.
Also on
Monday The Boston Herald reported ("Money
due to taxpayers hopefully paid in November, Charlie
Baker says"):
Baker has been clear he wants
taxpayers to get their money back as soon as possible,
but exactly when residents would see a check and how
much it would be seemed very up in the air before the
start of the weekend.
Last week a group of lawmakers
submitted a bill which would cap rebates under 62F at
$6,500, or about how much a person making $1 million in
2021 would be due back.
Previously, lawmakers had even
hinted they may look at doing away with 62F altogether
and keeping the tax excess to make up for a planned $4
billion in economic development that passed both
chambers of the Legislature unanimously but was shelved
after lawmakers learned they would need to give $3
billion back to residents.
On Monday, House Speaker Ron
Mariano, speaking alongside Baker after one of their
now-infrequent leadership meetings, said the proposal to
cap payments is a late filed bill and would need to go
through the entire legislative process before it is
considered, indicating that the full amount due out
under 62F — a proportional payment based off how much
you paid in taxes — will not be capped....
Baker wasn’t certain when in
November the Department of Revenue would issue checks to
taxpayers, but he said his administration is actively
working on the problem.
“Our goal is to have the DOR start
to move those things out sometime in November, but I
can’t answer today whether or not that’s all going to be
done by the end of the month or not,” he said. “I wish I
could.”
At this time, I
expect you and all Massachusetts taxpayers will have your
share of the $3 Billion in excess state revenue in
your deserving hands in mid- to late-November, by December
at the latest. It appears to now be just a matter of
logistics for the Department of Revenue
— calculating the proportionate
shares then getting them all out the door. A multitude
of grateful taxpayers can thank Citizens for Limited
Taxation and its loyal members for a few more billions of
their dollars in their pockets to add to the multiple
billions CLT already has saved them. It'll be a
fantastic way to end this glorious saga of limited
taxation!
|
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Chip Ford
Executive Director |
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State House News
Service
Monday, October 17, 2022
New Bulletin Spells Out State’s Tax Relief Approach
Refunds Replace Credits Under Commissioner Snyder's Plan
By Colin A. Young
The Baker administration took meaningful steps Friday
towards sending nearly $3 billion in excess state revenue
back to taxpayers, officially repealing the regulation that
governed how taxpayers obtained a credit the only other time
that Chapter 62F came into play, in 1987, and releasing a
technical document spelling out exactly how the process will
work this year.
About 3.6 million Bay Staters are expected to get back a
piece of $2.941 billion that state government is required to
return after it collected more in taxes last year than a
1986 voter law known as Chapter 62F allows. Auditor Suzanne
Bump certified that amount last month and the Baker
administration said it planned to return the money via
mailed checks or direct deposits, likely starting in
November. To be eligible, a taxpayer must have filed a 2021
state tax return by Monday.
The revelation that the mostly-forgotten law would come into
play and trim the size of the historic surplus that Beacon
Hill could carve up paralyzed legislative Democrats, who
have still not been able to come together around any path
forward on the massive economic development bill that they
prioritized earlier this year.
But while Chapter 62F's nearly $3 billion impact was not
clear until late July, the Department of Revenue began the
process of repealing the "obsolete" regulation that guided
62F distributions in April when it posted notice of a May
hearing on the little-known rules.
On Friday, DOR sent a notice saying that the regulation had
officially been repealed "because it is out-of-date."
The Baker administration told the New Service in August that
it got no public comments on its plan to repeal the
regulation (830 CMR 62F.6.1) stemming from the May hearing.
The regulation that was repealed described a process under
which a taxpayer "may claim an excess revenue credit toward
personal income tax liability for the current taxable year
equal to the taxpayer's personal income tax liability for
the previous taxable year multiplied by the excess revenue
percentage."
But with nearly $3 billion due back to taxpayers instead of
less than $30 million in 1987, Baker has said he wants the
money to go out as rebate checks in the coming weeks rather
than as a credit on next year's taxes.
To that end, DOR later on Friday also published a "technical
information release" that explains how the agency plans to
handle the excess revenue credit any time that the auditor
certifies that the state collected more than the Chapter 62F
cap allows. The document makes clear that it begins with the
"credits required to be issued for the fiscal year ending
June 30, 2022."
First, DOR will calculate the "excess revenue percentage"
that will be used to calculate the amount of a taxpayer's
excess revenue credit by "dividing the excess state tax
revenues determined by the State Auditor for the previous
fiscal year by the estimated total personal income tax
revenues received by the Commonwealth in the current
calendar year in payment of personal income tax liabilities
incurred for the previous taxable year." DOR said that will
happen after the deadline to file an eligible return, which
is Monday.
Next, DOR will multiply the liability as reported on a
taxpayer's personal income tax return (after being reduced
by any credits) by the "excess revenue percentage" to
calculate the taxpayer's excess revenue credit amount.
"Where the application of the excess revenue credit would
reduce a taxpayer's liability as reported on the taxpayer's
tax return filed for the previous year, the Department will
issue the amount of the reduction to said liability as a
refund. The excess revenue credit cannot reduce a taxpayer's
liability for the previous taxable year to an amount less
than zero," DOR wrote in the document.
It is unclear whether the administration has taken any
additional steps towards the distribution of Chapter 62F
money. A spokeswoman for the Executive Office of
Administration and Finance was out of the office when the
regulation repeal and new guidance was announced Friday. The
budget office's chief of staff, to whom media inquiries were
directed, did not acknowledge the News Service's questions.
What was made official Friday mirrored what the Baker
administration had announced a month ago. Since then, a top
senator quibbled with the administration's plan -- "The law
is pretty clear, in my opinion, if you read the law," Senate
Ways and Means Chairman Michael Rodrigues said last month.
"So if you're going to follow the law, which we're hoping
everybody follows the law, then there will be credits next
year." -- and a small group of progressives have launched a
bid to change how the excess revenue is returned to
taxpayers.
On July 31, Education Committee Co-chairwoman Rep. Alice
Peisch told the News Service that the regulatory repeal
effort suggested that Baker administration officials knew in
May that the law might trigger refunds, a situation that
Baker publicly disclosed in late July, after both branches
passed bills weighing in at more than $4 billion and
featuring a combination of direct spending and permanent tax
relief proposals.
"It would have been nice to get a bit of a head's up that it
looked like maybe we were getting to that point before we
did the economic development" bill, Peisch told the News
Service. During the same interview, she also said she has
"no idea if they knew or not" about the likelihood of
mandatory tax relief under 62F.
Baker has noted that lawmakers have access to the same
revenue collection figures as the administration does.
Monday afternoon could reveal exactly where House Speaker
Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka stand on
Baker's latest plan: the so-called Big Three is scheduled to
meet privately -- and then with the media -- at 12:30 p.m.
in what has become a rare leadership meeting.
— Michael P. Norton
contributed reporting
State House News
Service
Monday, October 17, 2022
Dems Still Wrestling With Economic Development Bill Basics
Spilka: Funding, Scope And Timing All Unresolved
Colin A. Young
To hear Gov. Charlie Baker tell it, the House and Senate are
about ready to dive into "end of year" activities, like
passing a spending bill to close out the books on the fiscal
year that ended more than three months ago.
"Both the House and Senate said by the time we got toward
the middle of October, they were going to start engaging in
some of the end of the year activity. And it seemed
appropriate to get together and catch up on what's been
going on," Baker said Monday afternoon after holding an
increasingly rare leadership meeting with House Speaker
Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka.
But Spilka and Mariano gave no such indications Monday when
they met with the press and instead said that the
Legislature is still struggling with "complications" related
to basics of the $4 billion economic development bill that
they left unresolved when their formal business concluded on
Aug. 1, like potential funding sources and the size of the
bill. And now, lawmakers are also discovering stumbling
blocks that affect the closeout budget bill that is
similarly in limbo.
"The House and Senate are actively working, really gearing
up and a lot of positive, constant communication, working
through the details, the potential funding, and scope and
timing, and all of the issues," Spilka said when asked about
the status of the economic development bill. "As you all
know, it's very complicated. There were a lot of things that
came up. So we are in constant communication about it."
The House and Senate each passed versions of a $4 billion
economic development bill unanimously but never agreed to a
final version this summer after the impact of paying out
nearly $3 billion in mandatory tax refunds under Chapter 62F
came to light.
Since then, Spilka and Mariano have said they planned to
keep negotiating the bill in hopes of passing some version
of it this fall. First, they wanted to wait for the state
auditor to certify the Baker administration's estimate of
the amount that needs to be returned under Chapter 62F. But
in the month since Auditor Suzanne Bump confirmed that
taxpayers are due $2.94 billion, the House and Senate have
given no indication that they are any closer to resolution.
Also pending before the Legislature is Gov. Charlie Baker's
$1.6 billion bill (H 5260) closing the books on fiscal year
2022, which ended June 30. The economic development bill
relies on fiscal year 2022 money and could factor into the
end-of-year closeout accounting. Comptroller William
McNamara under state law must file an annual financial
report by Oct. 31.
When asked specifically what was holding up the economic
development bill, Spilka said Monday, "There's a lot of
complications with the introduction of the other tax relief
at [Chapter] 62F. And close-out, there's just a lot of
economic revenue issues that have come up that are probably
more complicated than the usual end-of-session issues that
come up. So we are working through all of them."
The economic development bill was to include about $500
million in tax rebates, but neither Spilka nor Mariano would
commit Monday to passing the tax relief plan they agreed to
in July. Mariano called the Chapter 62F tax relief "a good
beginning" and said the House and Senate would continue to
negotiate around their own plan.
"There are some other areas of tax relief that I know that
the Senate would still prefer to see that we get done, some
other areas, but that's up for discussion," Spilka said.
Prompted by a reporter's question, Mariano also pointed out
that the Legislature could return to the topic of tax relief
when the new session starts in January.
"I think that's always an option. But right now we're
negotiating and, you know, the numbers have been consistent.
So we're gonna push forward and see where we end up," the
speaker said.
Mariano suggested Monday that he's not going to accommodate
serious consideration of a bill that Cambridge Rep. Mike
Connolly filed last week to change the way that Chapter 62F
money is distributed in order to cap refunds for wealthier
residents.
"The bill is going to go through the process, it's going to
be admitted as a late-file. But it's a significant change in
the legislation that, you know, I would like to see the full
body be involved in the debate. Right now we're in a lame
duck session [and] there's about 15 people that will be
voting that won't be here next year. So I think that that
creates a bit of a problem," Mariano said.
Asked if the House would be more likely to tackle a bill
like that next session, the speaker responded, "If there
will be changes, I would think that would be the logical
place to do it."
The Boston
Herald
Monday, October 17, 2022
Money due to taxpayers hopefully paid in November, Charlie
Baker says
By Matthew Medsger
If Gov. Charlie Baker gets his way residents will have a tax
rebate check in hand sometime this November, he just isn’t
sure when, exactly.
“My hope all along was that we would be able to get these
out to people on time so that they would be able to spend
them on fuel, on gas, on holidays, on basically the expenses
that I think a lot of people are anticipating they are going
to have that are going to be much higher than they thought
they were going to be,” he said.
About $3 billion is due back to taxpayers under Chapter 62F
of the General Laws after the commonwealth took too much in
taxes in 2021.
Baker has been clear he wants taxpayers to get their money
back as soon as possible, but exactly when residents would
see a check and how much it would be seemed very up in the
air before the start of the weekend.
Last week a group of lawmakers submitted a bill which would
cap rebates under 62F at $6,500, or about how much a person
making $1 million in 2021 would be due back.
Previously, lawmakers had even hinted they may look at doing
away with 62F altogether and keeping the tax excess to make
up for a planned $4 billion in economic development that
passed both chambers of the Legislature unanimously but was
shelved after lawmakers learned they would need to give $3
billion back to residents.
On Monday, House Speaker Ron Mariano, speaking alongside
Baker after one of their now-infrequent leadership meetings,
said the proposal to cap payments is a late filed bill and
would need to go through the entire legislative process
before it is considered, indicating that the full amount due
out under 62F — a proportional payment based off how much
you paid in taxes — will not be capped.
“The bill is going to go through the process, it’s going to
be admitted as a late-file. But it’s a significant change in
the legislation that, you know, I would like to see the full
body be involved in the debate. Right now we’re in a lame
duck session, there’s about 15 people that will be voting
that won’t be here next year. I think that that creates a
bit of a problem,” Mariano said.
Baker wasn’t certain when in November the Department of
Revenue would issue checks to taxpayers, but he said his
administration is actively working on the problem.
“Our goal is to have the DOR start to move those things out
sometime in November, but I can’t answer today whether or
not that’s all going to be done by the end of the month or
not,” he said. “I wish I could.”
Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka said that
lawmakers continue to work on the economic development
package, which originally passed on August 1, but that both
it and the $1.2 billion required to close out the year end
budget are still stuck in committee.
“The House and Senate are actively working, really gearing
up and a lot of positive, constant communication, working
through the details, the potential funding, and scope and
timing, and all of the issues,” Spilka said. “As you all
know, it’s very complicated. There were a lot of things that
came up. So we are in constant communication about it.”
State House News
Service
Friday, October 21, 2022
Weekly Roundup - To-Do List Looms Beyond The Finish Line
Recap and analysis of the week in state government
By Colin A. Young
The next governor is going to have a lot on their plate when
they take office early next year.
As they work on building out their executive branch, forging
relationships with the Legislature, other Constitutional
officers and advocates as well as turning their campaign
promises into action, Geoff Diehl or Maura Healey will also
walk into office in the middle of a budget year facing
transportation troubles, crunch time for energy and climate
initiatives, a chance to help dole out billions in federal
aid, and an electorate eager to hear details on how the next
governor will address the high costs of living in
Massachusetts.
The biggest and most pressing matter waiting for a new
governor could be transportation. Leave the panoply of
problems with the MBTA aside for a moment and think about
the commuting challenges that plague people outside Greater
Boston every day: congestion to rival the nostrils of a
toddler at day care, regional transit networks that can't
always get people where they're going when they need to be
there, practically no way to get from one end of the state
to the other by train, and disintegrating roads and bridges.
"We're going to have some hard stuff to do with respect to
transportation," Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll, who is hoping to
be elected lieutenant governor next month, said Tuesday
during an event that looked solely at the T's existential
crisis.
The T doesn't have enough employees to run the full service
that riders expect and pay for, but it also doesn't have
enough fare-paying riders to bring in the money it's going
to need to pay for the kinds of big projects that could help
the agency climb out from under the thumb of safety
investigators at the Federal Transit Administration.
Meanwhile, some politicians are pushing for some free fares
and underserved areas are clamoring for expanded train and
bus routes.
The Legislature has already started pumping millions of
dollars in one-time cash into the MBTA -- should we read
anything into the total, $666 million? -- and U.S. Sen.
Elizabeth Warren says another $580 million will go to the T
for "modernization and safety improvements" under a federal
infrastructure law.
Another option for lawmakers, and possibly the next
governor, would be to put some of the state's remaining $2.3
billion in federal American Rescue Plan Act to use at the T.
That money has to be obligated by end of 2024, but the next
governor is going to have a hand in spreading that cash
across the commonwealth whenever the Legislature decides how
to spend it.
"It looks like that's going to happen," Senate Ways and
Means Committee Chairman Michael Rodrigues said in July when
asked if Senate Democrats were waiting for the next governor
to take office in January to decide how to use the final
chunk of ARPA money.
The House and Senate planned to use about $1.4 billion of
that ARPA pot in the economic development bill that's been
on ice since the end of July. Since then, it seems like the
bill has been moved into the bottom of a chest freezer.
Asked about progress on the bill, Senate President Karen
Spilka said this week that talks were "really gearing up"
and listed details negotiators were working through: "the
potential funding, and scope and timing, and all of the
issues."
House Speaker Ronald Mariano said talks around the
Legislature's own tax relief plan would continue -- the plan
announced July 7 called for checks to be delivered by the
end of September -- but also noted that leaving tax relief
and reform to the next session (and implicitly the next
governor) is "always an option." Mariano's preferred
candidate, Democrat Maura Healey, has meanwhile been calling
on the Legislature to hurry up and pass the tax reforms
proposed by Republican Gov. Charlie Baker.
The outgoing governor and both people vying to be his
successor agree on one thing: the nearly $3 billion in
excess state revenue that's due back to taxpayers should go
out under Baker, not the next governor. That Chapter 62F
money is expected to start flowing next month.
But if Democrats try to make changes to the tax cap law that
took them by surprise, Mariano said it would almost
certainly happen next session. The next governor could have
to decide whether to sign legislation changing the law that
voters put in place in 1986. Some progressives are pushing
for changes to cap how much a wealthy taxpayer could get
back, but legislative leaders have previously floated the
idea that they could make broader changes to a law they seem
to have forgotten about.
And if Question 1 passes on next month's ballot, the next
governor will be responsible (in their second year in
office) for proposing a state budget that taps into the
estimated $1.3 billion that the proposed Constitutional
amendment might raise via an income surtax on wealthier
residents. That money, if the Legislature agrees to
appropriate it at all, can only be spent on education or
transportation and surtax supporters will be watching
closely to make sure Beacon Hill doesn't pull a
bait-and-switch as opponents warn.
"I don't think there's any question that their top priority
in the next year's budget, if this amendment passes, will be
increasing funding to our schools, increasing funding to the
T, and our roads and bridges," Andrew Farnitano,
communications director for Fair Share Massachusetts, said
last week during a debate on the proposal. "It's just not
reasonable to expect that they're going to spend it on
anything else or even try to."
The next governor will be elected to a term that runs from
January 2023 until January 2027 -- crunch time for meeting
the state's legal requirement of a 50 percent reduction in
greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. And the next
administration is also going to be the one to actually
cement the rules for a controversial 10-town pilot project
under which fossil fuels could be banned from new
construction.
"[T]o be fair, it would be up to the next administration to
finalize that package in the way that they see fit and be
ready to move forward," Energy and Environmental Affairs
Secretary Beth Card said this week when laying out a
timeline for the program created under this summer's climate
law to launch.
Also this week, the Legislature showed that it can get big
things done even while it meets only in informal sessions.
House and Senate lawmakers agreed unanimously this summer to
restrict step therapy -- when some patients are made to try
and fail on insurance-preferred treatments before being
approved for a more expensive prescription -- and on
Thursday moved on a compromise that lawmakers and advocates
think could soon end up on Gov. Baker's desk.
Sound familiar? The economic development and tax relief
bills that have had the House and Senate at loggerheads for
months were also passed unanimously but left unreconciled
when the formal session clock expired Aug. 1.
It seems unlikely that an economic development bill will get
done before the Nov. 8 elections, so that could be another
thing that the governor-elect will have to think about this
winter.
LOOSE ENDS: Cybercriminals got away with $3.5 million stolen
from the Quincy Retirement Board and there was more than
enough blame to go around in the report the state Public
Employee Retirement Administration Commission published ...
He's long been one of Beacon Hill's go-to people when it
comes to pretty much anything involving the state budget,
and starting Jan. 1 Doug Howgate will take over as president
of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, a role he called
a "dream job" ... Gaming regulators are plugging away at the
mountain of work they must get done before legal sports
betting can start, but some around the Gaming Commission are
already starting to fret that the "late January" and "early
March" targets for in-person and mobile betting are a bit
too ambitious.
STORY OF THE WEEK: The next governor is going to come into
office with their own ideas, goals and plans, but some
weighty issues are going to demand attention early in their
first term.
SONG OF THE WEEK: The House and Senate's tax relief checks
were supposed to be in hand three weeks ago and the
taxpayers who have fueled the state's cash surge have a
message for lawmakers: "I
can't wait, wait for you to change your mind." |
NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this
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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
Citizens for Limited Taxation ▪
PO Box 1147 ▪ Marblehead, MA 01945
▪ (781) 639-9709
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