While House and Senate leaders bicker over their stripped-down version of a tax
cut, Gov. Paul Cellucci is taking his case to the people.
The governor will join forces with Citizens for Limited Taxation in a petition
drive to put an income tax cut measure on the ballot in November 2000.
Cellucci, Citizens for Limited Taxation and this newspaper have long maintained
that reducing the state's income tax rate from 5.95 percent to 5 percent isn't just the
smart thing to do (it will be good for the economy), it's also the right thing to do. The
increase, put into effect a decade ago, was supposed to be temporary - just something to
help bail the state out of a tight fiscal situation.
Well, the fiscal crisis has long since passed, but the "temporary" tax
lingers on.
Yesterday was merely the beginning of a long and difficult process of getting this
petition on the ballot. Assuming the attorney general and secretary of state sign off on
the wording of the petition, volunteers will likely begin collecting signatures by
mid-September. They'll have about two months to gather at least 57,100 signatures. In
fact, with some strict new standards imposed by the Supreme Judicial Court about exactly
how those petitions must look to those who sign them, proponents will likely have to
gather at least 100,000 signatures to make sure they have enough valid ones.
That's a formidable task, but it's one that each and every voter can help with
come this fall by -- literally -- signing on.