GOP standard-bearer Mitt Romney eagerly joined the no-new-tax brigade yesterday,
vowing not to stop the voter-approved income tax rollback or hike other levies - all
while boosting services and dodging layoffs.
"All voters ... care about great education, improving our
environment, bringing more jobs to Massachusetts and balancing the budget without raising taxes ... That being the case, I
think I have a very strong proposition to take to the voters of Massachusetts," Romney said.
Calling it "my pledge," Romney vowed not to support a freeze
or reversal of the plan to roll income taxes back to 5 percent by next year even in the face of a budget hole nearing $3
billion. Romney chided Democrats for taking the "easy way" to fix problems by passing the
tax hat.
"The easy way to fix any problem is to go to the people and
say you have to pay more money, but that's not what the job of management is," Romney said. "That's my pledge, we
are not going to raise taxes, we are not going to walk away from what the voters are in favor
of doing, which is bringing the tax rates down."
The bold pronouncement chafed Democrats running for
governor, who said that even acting Gov. Jane M. Swift admitted she couldn't save jobs, boost programs and cut taxes.
"I think it transparent that he doesn't know what he's
talking about - he's here for two days and he's promising all things to all people," said Senate President Thomas F.
Birmingham.
The 55-year-old Belmont millionaire took the tough-on-taxes
stand on the second day of his campaign, embracing the tax policies of Swift and former Govs. Paul Cellucci and William F.
Weld. Though most of the Democrats have endorsed a freeze in the rollback until the
recession ends, Romney said that is typical government thinking.
"The job of management is to find ways to permanently and
structurally change the costs of our structure such that we can have a balanced budget without always raising taxes every
time people think there's a need," Romney said.
Romney, CEO of the Salt Lake Olympic games, said his
experience in Utah taught him waste can be found and rooted out....
Elisabeth J. Beardsley contributed to this report
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The MetroWest Daily News
Thursday, March 21, 2002
Excise taxes eyed in crunch
By Michael Kunzelman
Cities and towns should be allowed to hike excise tax rates
in order to help them weather potentially deep cuts in state aid, a panel of state lawmakers said yesterday.
Raising the excise tax by $5 for every $1,000 of a vehicle's
value could generate up to $130 million in new revenue for cash-strapped communities, according to a report prepared by
members of a House "working group" on local aid.
The excise tax rate hasn't changed since the passage of
Proposition 2½ two decades ago, when the state lowered the maximum to $25 per $1,000.
Cities and towns set their own excise rates, but the
Legislature has to approve any change in the maximum.
"This isn't one of my favorite taxes, but there are a couple
good things about it," said one member of the working group, state Rep. David Linsky, D-Natick. "It's deductible on your
federal taxes, and, two, it goes directly to cities and towns."
Another group member, state Rep. Susan Pope, said the excise
tax proposal "is one that I'm not totally behind right now."
"I'm not one who favors raising taxes," the Wayland
Republican said. "It's a minimal amount, but it's another tax on people when the economy is doing poorly."
State Rep. Lida Harkins, a Needham Democrat and chairman of
the working group, said the proposal is one of many ideas the panel generated in an effort to offset a potential 10 percent
cut in local aid.
"The clear mission of this group was to anticipate the level
of cuts and look at the kind of recommendations that might help local communities weather that by giving them more
flexibility," she said.
Framingham Town Manager George King said the $5 increase in
the excise tax rate would generate about $1.3 million in new revenue for the town.
Although he said he isn't trying to "look a gift horse in
the mouth," King called the proposal "another regressive tax."
"Unlike the income tax, it's not built on people's ability
to pay," he said. "We need a quick, comprehensive solution, not a quick fix."
The panel's report identified other "key areas" where the
state could offset cuts in local aid, including:
Of the latter idea, Linsky said, "So many towns in MetroWest
are doing school construction, so there's some real potential cost saving there."
The working group also listed other potential revenue
generating proposals that could prove to be more controversial, such as delaying the income tax rollback, calling a moratorium
on the creation of new charter schools and reducing lottery payouts.
Harkins said the report is a "starting point" for the Ways
and Means Committee to consider as it drafts the budget for fiscal 2003.
"We're asking cities and towns to help direct us where we
should look to make those cuts less painful," she added.
House Speaker Thomas Finneran appointed the members of the
working group. The report was prepared by a subcommittee of 14 House members, including Pope and Linsky, who
have been meeting about twice a week since the beginning of February.
House members discussed the contents of the report during a
two-hour long bipartisan caucus yesterday.
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The Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Friday, March 22, 2002
Budgeting 'tools' pack proposed
By Shaun Sutner
Telegram & Gazette Staff
BOSTON -- Rather than watch municipal services fall victim to
the state budget deficit, some local officials welcome a package of proposed money-raising and saving options
designed to blunt the effect of state aid cuts.
The new tools include higher auto excise taxes, loosening
the Proposition 2½ cap on property tax hikes, lengthening the payback period for school building loans and providing
more flexibility in negotiating municipal employee contracts.
"They're important as they give us options, which are
probably needed this year and maybe next year to soften some of the cuts we're going to be facing," Worcester Mayor Timothy P.
Murray said. "But we still hope that cuts in local aid and education funding will be kept to a
minimum."
The proposals came from a legislative working group
appointed by House Speaker Thomas M. Finneran that examined ways towns and cities could raise money apart from state
funding.
These are all "local options" -- the Legislature would
authorize communities to approve them for local use.
Under the plan, communities would be allowed to raise excise
rates by $5 per $1,000. The current rate is capped at $25 per $1,000 and has not been raised in 25 years. If every
community hiked the tax by $5 it would raise about $130 million.
The proposals have been made as Mr. Finneran is warning
municipal officials to expect local aid reductions of up to 10 percent to help cover the state deficit expected to reach $2
billion by July 2003.
While Gov. Jane M. Swift wants to keep local aid near
current levels, even stable funding would be felt as a cut because such municipal costs as union contracts and pension
costs keep rising.
City and town officials already are raising the prospect of
employee layoffs if local aid is cut more than 5 percent.
Meanwhile, state lawmakers are looking at 16 proposed tax
increases, including returning the state income tax to 5.6 or 5.95 percent, to make up the shortfall.
All told, the taxes would raise $1.98 billion, though it is
unlikely the Legislature will pass more than half the proposals.
Some critics of the Legislature say lawmakers have been too
quick both to raise state taxes and to look to municipalities to raise local taxes.
"I don't think the first answer to a revenue crisis is
raising taxes," Fitchburg Mayor Dan H. Mylott said. "The Legislature has to understand that local aid is a
responsibility they have and not something they can play around with.
"We are an obligation they need to pay, not a discretionary
account as some programs are, "he said.
One of the options put out by the working group was to
exempt local property tax overlay funds from Proposition 2½, which limits tax increases to
2½ percent a year. Overlay accounts contain local tax revenues set aside to pay for tax
abatements to senior citizens and other refunds.
In Worcester, officials are unlikely to use this option
because the city already taxes less than it could under Proposition 2½. But in some communities which tax to the
limit, it could create a little more revenue.
State Rep. George N. Peterson Jr., R-Grafton, who served on
the working group but opposes many of the provisions, said the overlay proposal amounts to a direct assault on
Proposition 2½.
"Proposition 2½ is Proposition 2½," he said. "Voters
put it in to protect citizens in local communities from excessive property taxes."
But the majority of the 14 legislators who participated in
the group support the proposals to help the state's 351 cities and towns balance their budgets.
And some of the options are likely more palatable to many
communities than trying to override Proposition 2½, noted Rep. Vincent A. Pedone, D-Worcester, a member of the
group.
"This gives them another vehicle to raise revenues," Mr.
Pedone said. "My belief is that property taxes are one of the most regressive taxes we have."
Other ideas recommended by the working group include
allowing communities to use early retirement incentives and state mandates governing environmental regulations and public
construction bidding.
The group also suggested other, somewhat more controversial,
ideas be considered. These include placing a moratorium on new charter schools, issuing more Keno licenses, trimming
Lottery prizes and reducing the scope of the Quinn Bill, which pays bonuses to police
officers who earn education degrees.
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The Boston Herald
Friday, March 22, 2002
A Boston Herald editorial
State's most hated tax
This must be a bad joke, right?
How else to explain the fact that House Speaker Tom
Finneran's special panel on taxation has put forth among its first recommendations an increase in what is without doubt the
state's most hated tax - the auto excise tax.
Back in 1980 voters - and drivers - who were fed up with the
tax went to the ballot box and as part of Proposition 2½ managed to reduce it from $75 [sic - $66] per $1,000 valuation
to $25 per $1,000 per car. The whole notion of making drivers pay a tax on their cars year
in and year out for the life of that vehicle always grated on people. When the tax was made
less onerous it became somewhat less obnoxious as well.
But you can't keep a bad idea - or apparently a tax rate -
down in this state. So House Majority Whip Lida Harkins (D-Needham), who chaired the special panel, Wednesday
announced that the group was supporting a $5 increase in the excise tax,
bringing it to $30 per $1,000 value, to provide another $130 million a year to cities and towns, which collect it.
Now the other way to say that - oh, and pols just hate when
you do this - is that it will also take $130 million more a year directly out of the pockets of drivers.
Harkins also offered the usual muddy-headed explanation
that, of course, the tax rate hadn't increased in more than two decades - a fact that apparently offends her sensibilities for
some reason. It also ignores the fact that while the tax rate hasn't risen, the price of cars has
increased astronomically, providing real growth in revenue. Each and every one of those
dreaded SUVs so despised by environmentalists is bringing in about $750 a year or more.
The voters gave themselves a much-needed solution to a
vexing tax problem back in 1980, and heaven help the legislator who wants to take it away now.
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The Boston Globe
Friday, March 22, 2002
Report details court waste
Legislature hit on patronage
By Ralph Ranalli
Globe Staff
For weeks, state Representative Corey Atkins has been
looking for a way to restore prenatal care programs for poor pregnant women to the state budget. Yesterday, she said
she'd found it.
With a new report charging that the Legislature's centuries-old, patronage-driven
stranglehold on court budgets has caused massive waste, Atkins and other lawmakers trying
to salvage state programs said Beacon Hill lawmakers may finally be forced to look at giving
the judicial branch control of its own money.
"I'm looking for $2 million for prenatal care," Atkins, a
Concord Democrat said. "And we spent $18 million last year on unnecessary court employees."
Massachusetts is currently the only state in the country
where court officials do not allocate resources themselves across different courts. Instead, through an unusual and
Byzantine budget process, legislators fund thousands of line items in 161 micro-budgets for individual
courthouses and court programs, often creating jobs that critics say usually go to
candidates with political sponsors.
The study, released this week by the non-partisan Pioneer
Institute and former Dorchester District Court Judge James Dolan, charged that the Legislature's micromanagement of court
budgets results in rampant waste and irrational allocation of resources, effectively negating
attempts at court reform by keeping the judiciary a "political extension of the legislative
branch."
State Representative Michael Festa, a Melrose Democrat who,
along with Atkins, attended a Suffolk Law School breakfast yesterday at which the report was released, said lawmakers
staring at a possible budget deficit next year of $3 billion need to take a new look at the
courts.
"In the context of that crisis, the question becomes, "Are
we going to seize the high ground and say we can do more to allocate these resources better?"' he said.
Festa, who said his view is shared "by a number of other
lawmakers," said he will host Chief Justice Barbara Dortch-Okara at the State House to discuss the Dolan study.
Dolan's report charges that over the last four years, even
as caseloads statewide dropped by more than 5 percent, legislators were still stuffing hundreds of patronage hires
into the courts at a payroll cost of more than $50 million.
The report comes as the court system is struggling to close
a $40 million budget gap, laying off 185 employees and forcing most of those remaining to work for eight days without pay.
Money for most court translators is expected to run out in mid-April.
The study said legislative meddling has resulted in some
courts being grossly overstaffed while essential services, such as interpreters, who are generally outside the patronage
system, are being cut. Court reform efforts will continue to be moot, the report charges, until
Massachusetts joins the other 49 states in giving the judiciary discretionary control over
where resources go.
The report found that the legislature added 434 court
positions that were not requested by the Administrative Office of the Trial Court from 1998 through 2001, at a cost of $50.1
million at a time when the court system's overall caseload had dropped.
When the courts did request additional personnel, the study
said, those requests were rejected, including a request for 18 probation officers to ease caseloads in various courts.
Instead, according to the report, lawmakers forced the courts to hire 17 higher-paid
probation supervisors to work in the Commissioner of Probation's office.
The study argues that patronage hiring has raised the
average cost of handling cases by 46 percent over a five-year period.
Whether the legislative leadership will go along, however,
is another question, since many top House and Senate figures have been among the current system's most ardent defenders.
Legislative leaders ignored a court-backed proposal last
year by then-Governor Paul Cellucci that would have consolidated the court budgets, instead moving to solidify
their power over court hiring by stripping judges of their authority over probation officers and
assistant clerks.
"I submit that the reason that power was taken away from
them was because some of the judges said 'no' to patronage hiring requests from lawmakers," Dolan said.
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