Property Tax “Compromise”

Posted by Jeff Pruitt - 3/14/08 @ 2:39 pm - Filed Under 2008 Local Elections, Featured, State Politics

I think it’s a bit disingenuous to call this a compromise - it’s almost exactly what the governor wanted and nothing like the ridiculous plan put forward by state Democrats a week ago. Just so we all remember let’s recap the Democratic plan:

  1. No protection for any class of property taxpayer other than homeowners.
  2. No referendums on capital projects or other spending controls on local government.
  3. No reform of the assessment system.
  4. No elimination of property tax levies.

Absolutely NONE of that is in the “compromise” bill. The only compromise I see was exempting Lake and St Joseph counties which should’ve been done via referendum and not mandated by the state. So what exactly was the point of putting forward a politically inferior bill and then caving a week later? It makes absolutely no sense and only served to undermine the Democratic party’s progress in this state. Somebody might want to tell the speaker that if he is going to put forward his own plan it should be one that 70% of the people aren’t against and it should be done before the 11th hour…

Comments

2 Responses to “Property Tax “Compromise””

  1. Kevin Knuth on March 14th, 2008 4:06 pm

    Jeff,

    When you want compromise on ANYTHING, you sometimes have to run to the fringe end.

    ;)

    I think the Dems got what they wanted overall. I do, however, have a concern that the whole thing may not past legal muster- there is specific language for a few counties….I thought we could not do that anymore.

    Anyone know more about that?

  2. Jeff Pruitt on March 14th, 2008 4:16 pm

    Well I’m sure you’re right about that but I wish they could’ve done it without making it so public because I think it hurt their credibility.

    I still can’t wait for the masses to figure out that this is really a tax increase…

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