Secretary William F. Galvin whose office is able to monitor the number of locally certified ballot signatures through a central data system has announced that both the automatic gas tax and the (special interest/corporate monopoly) casino/slots law have garnered enough signatures for the November 2014 ballot.
Beacon Hill is tone deaf. Leadership and many elected officials are disconnected from the sentiments of the average citizen in the Commonwealth. Ballot initiatives take a gargantuan effort that requires passion, time, funding, and organization – as well as a groundswell of collective opinion.
We want solutions, not more of the same. We want real reform – some see that as curtailing the reach and expense of government and others see reform through a progressive lens that improves efficiency, effectiveness and balances fiscal burdens across the income and wealth spectrum.
The Globe reported,
“Beacon Hill could face a backlash at the ballot box next year if voters approve referendums that would repeal the state’s casino law and eliminate automatic increases in the gas tax.
The ballot questions are among seven referendums that appear to have garnered enough signatures to qualify for the November 2014 ballot, according to Secretary of State William F. Galvin.
The casino and gas-tax questions would undo major initiatives passed by state lawmakers and signed by Governor Deval Patrick in recent years. They would also have serious implications for the state budget, which relies on tens of millions of dollars in gambling and gas revenue to pay for transportation and other needs. “It would force difficult choices to be made,” said Stephen M. Brewer, a Barre Democrat who is the state Senate’s budget chief. “We would be governed by what the vox populi says.”
Repealthecasinodeal.org has garnered momentum as more people have begun to realize the negative and costly impacts of the predatory gambling industry. Informed citizens are the power base and solution to what challenges our society – if and when we act.
The vox populi is shouting.
While I would love to see the casino law repealed, I fear the gas tax initiative will be perceived as another “anti-tax revolt” that will ironically exacerbate the very problem that brought it on in the first place. Massachusetts *should* have increased the income tax significantly (probably to 6%) and cut other more regressive taxes, but they were so scared of the last anti-tax revolt that barely 1/4 of legislators would consider that seriously. Instead, they went for regressive half-measures like a gas tax increase.
We have to defeat this anti-gas-tax question at all costs. Passing it would be one of the most destructive acts against the state of Massachusetts in decades.
Why would the tax repeal be linked to the casino bill?
I’m not saying the two have to be linked. I’m commenting on this post, above. It talks about both ballot questions, and ties them together in an implied general theme of the legislature overstepping and the public reining them in with a backlash, in the form of both of these questions.
While I know the Legislature views a casino as a source of revenue, I am not sure the public does.
In your post, you mentioned both of them, implying a link. Why?
You say “in your post” but this is not my post, so now I’m not sure whether you’re responding to my comment, or critiquing the post itself – which is where the link was made. To be clear, I am *not* saying there needs to be a connection between these two questions. I am responding to this post, which talked about the gas tax question, and which also implied a thematic link between it and the casino question. Note that I did not focus on that thematic link – though I clearly don’t like it. However, my comment focused primarily on the gas tax question, and not on the post’s implied link between it and the casino question. I really don’t understand why you’re harping on that link, unless you’re critiquing the original post, in which case I don’t get why you’re replying to my comments rather than to the post itself.
In your COMMENT on this POST, you appear to AFFIRM THE TENUOUS CONNECTION between these two ballot questions. So I was asking WHY, which, as you note, could have been asked of the original POSTER and not in reply to your COMMENT.
I guess I should have gone shopping today. 🙂 Have a good weekend!
on the front page, saying the legislature’s revenue plans may be in shambles if both the casino and the gas tax questions pass.
All it does is stop the automatic annual increase built into the bill. Saying passing this initiative, which I signed to get on the ballot, would be the most “destructive acts” is a great hyperbole.
Never allow any government to have automatic tax increases, make the politicians vote to increase your taxes, it’s called accountability.
Politically, a vote for this question will be seen as a success for the “anti-tax” movement, whose phantom ruled Massachusetts politics for a couple of decades and still has a lot of influence despite a couple of defeats in recent elections. Thanks to those defeats, though, we have had a few baby steps showing the legislature isn’t 100% spooked anymore. If a question like this passes, that’ll be over for a while.
It’s not hyperbole. We MUST defeat that question. It’s extremely poisonous and its passage will undermine our infrastructure and our economy and our future and will almost certainly literally kill people, as state underfunding continues to contribute to poverty, homelessness, crime, lack of adequate defense for indigents, etc.
P.S. Yes, I’d like to see the casino law repaired. But that’s an issue that pales in comparison. It’s weird to see this blog post start by talking about both, and then focus on the much smaller issue, even if it’s one I agree with.
Please see Sleeples’ comments. I erred in not parsing the very different issues presented in tandem by the referenced article.
It’s called dodging accountability and you can look to California where taxes were lowered and services increased by voters and legislators who didnt know any better. Scaring legislators into choosing short term popular anti-tax decisions at the expense of long term fiscal responsibility is exactly the cause of our national and state level budget messes. Or IL where funding pensions was voted in as a constitutional amendment along with a regressive tax cut. Everyone wants big government, but it takes a responsible voter and legislator willing to pay for it to ensure it can function. As a responsible voter I will vote Yes on Repealing Casinos and no on Repealing Gas Tax. That will force the legislature to raise real sustainable revenue in a progressive manner. That’s real accountability!
it’s an automatic adjustment to inflation. It is minor and something absolutely no one would notice year to year, but would prevent our state from being in its previous predicament — dealing with 2013 infrastructure costs at a gas tax rate from about 1990.
I’m sorry, that’s how I feel.
Govt should try to live with less or find ways to merge departments (ie polic and fire should be combined). Govt needs to begin to find ways to spend what they have “more efficiently”.
If this gas tax initiative is voted down, it will set a terrible precedent for future legislatures to pass tax increases on income and sales, adjusted to inflation, and yes, people do notice it.
Get the bullseye off the struggling tax payers who are barely afloat as it is. It’s about time to go after the walruses on Beacon Hill. Vote YES on gas tax repeal. If the politicians want more money, then debate it and vote on it. Hopefully, the people of this state wake up.
Sales taxes and income taxes are in a sense adjusted for inflation. Since they are percentages rather than flat amounts if the price of an item or your income increases, the sales or income tax will increase respectively. I for one am a New Dealer and while I don’t think anyone will argue with efficiency I want the public sector to have and spend more, especially in times like this. We’d be a lot further along in our recovery if we dropped the austerity fetish on the part of our governments.
Sales and income taxes are in a sense, adjusted for inflation…as the economy grows, revenues to the govt increase. YET, in spite of this, Deval and the Democrats jacked up the sales tax 25%, from 5% to 6.25% a few years ago, due to insufficient revenues to feed The Beast up on Beacon Hill.
“I want the public sector to have and spend more”. My God, what a dangerous statement, my eyes are bugging out. I want the public sector to have spend only on what is absolutely necessary, and to tax only what it needs, NOT WHAT IT WANTS!
Remember Christopher, we could give them 100% of our earnings, and they, the government, would find a way to run a deficit, and ask for blood.
Petr pointed out the government is us. If the public sector has adequate resources we all benefit; if not we all suffer. After all, politicians have to pay taxes on their own income and purchases so its not like they don’t feel it either. Public spending is also stimulative thus lifting all the proverbial economic boats. If you’d rather the private economy be the engine of growth you would support a hike in the minimum wage which besides being fair is also stimulative and leads to less need for some public services. Back to the title question, keep in mind when answering I want YOU to sacrifice; don’t just say we should cut this program that you personally don’t benefit from anyway.
The gas tax hasn’t been raised in around 25 years. Presumably all the “waste” has been eliminated, all the “savings” have been found. So why is it problematic for the budget to now increase (or decrease) with inflation?
So they are getting their gas tax money. The state also gets a nice chunk of change from the sales tax on the purchases of automobiles. Having automatic tax increases promotes waste, fraud and abuse. We really should support this initiative, which again, does not roll back the 3 cent tax hike, only the auto-increase aspect of it.
Prove it; don’t just assert it. Show us the numbers.
VS Guilford RR replacing 72 miles (Haverhill MA to Portland ME) of track for $50 million.
Fraud is Susan Bump finding tens of thousands of EBT cards going to people who don’t exist.
Abuse is having $19 billion in unfunded pension obligations, $19 billion in unfunded health care obligations, and asking me to give more to the government so they can ring up even higher debts for our kids to pay.
That is just a sampling. Big Dig going from $2.9 Billion to $16 billion, Mass Port garage attendants raking over six figure salaries, no wonder it costs an arm and a leg to park at Logan. Pension of six figures, some over $200K, $10 million to refurbish Deval’s office. On and on and on. And you want to give them more?
The line about giving more to the government to ring up higher debts makes no sense. If we give more to the federal government then they go less into debt. On the state level we require a balanced budget per the constitution I’m pretty sure.
The EBT in the scheme of things is barely worth mentioning – a drop in the bucket.
I’m fine with pension and health obligations, but if they are unfunded that’s an argument for more money to cover them, not less.
You’ll have to cite some of the other stuff. I especially find six figures to be a garage attendant hard to believe.
http://www.myfoxboston.com/story/17682334/some-logan-parking-lot-attendants-make-100g-a-year
My goodness Christopher, if Beacon Hill has rung up unfunded pension and health care debts, you want to give them more of your money? I would say do away with the program, cut your budgets and role back the scale of government. I did not say eliminate, I said roll it back some
…BUT the article you link does say that on this one the Patrick administration was trying to rein that in.
Yes, if there are debts needing to be paid then more money is needed to pay them off. Just like for my personal debts I wouldn’t have so much if I had more money to pay them off.
The Greenbush line is needed because it enables public transportation for a large group of people. People who live nearby. Since large numbers of people live there, land costs more. I encourage you to compare the cost of Maine real estate in the Portland area to that of the South Shore.
“They” are us. Oh, and by the way, the Big Dig was managed by the Governor’s office, and the holder of the that office was Republican during almost all of that run-up. Further, the cost of the ALTERNATIVES to the Big Dig was many times more.
You are simply throwing horse manure around, hoping some of it will stick someplace. The result is an almighty stench and nothing more.
Real estate values had nothing to do with replacing existing tracks, the costs rang up due to opulent spending by the MBTA to construct open air tunnels, so the “upper crust” didn’t have to see the commuter rail pass by.
n/m
With more cars on the road, there’s more wear and tear on the roads. Believe me, I’ve noticed as I’ve replaced struts three years in a row.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/2013/12/01/slick-conditions-causing-accidents-across-central-massachusetts/qJYHHVZlal0ohhj5zF1MvM/story.html
we should not fund infrastructure projects anymore, let everything collapse? I read your comments and I don’t get them, they are bizarre.
And we have what we have. There is no ‘they’. The government is us.
You are hereby invited to go and get yourself elected to the legislature and work to change whatever it is you want to change. Go for it.
You are further warned about trying to passive aggressively maim government from the outside: there is no outside, so you are only trying to hurt yourself as well as the rest of us.
There is no bullseye and the struggling taxpayers are only struggling because of years upon years of ‘austerity budgets’ and fundamental misunderstandings about both government and economics.
The government struggles because we struggle. We struggle because the government struggles. There is nothing other than us. And that us is the government and that government is us.
Obamacare for one. This gas tax is nothing more than a “war on “cars” which most middle class folks need in order to get to work, in other words, survive!
This casino bill is another bullseye on the middle class, it us they who will flip the bill when it comes time to help the poor who play at these resorts and blow their monthly check.
I would like to run for public office, I just don’t believe someone like me, who would run in a platform asking the people to do with less government, and the government to do with less of the taxpayers monies, is a winning message.
It’s essentially what the GOP has run on for years and they do alright.
Why I believe JFK would be a Republican today, a liberal Republican, but a Republican.
Today, I believe a majority of voters demand more than the basic services from government, and if their neighbors have to do with less, so be it.
if you look at their platform in absolutes. That’s why most folks around here are Democrats, liberals, progressives. We want our society to advance and improve, not be stuck in the mud. If the best Kennedy can do in 2016 is end lynching and desegregate lunch counters then you’re right, he’s a modern day Republican.
If, on the other hand, you consider that Kennedy stood up for dramatically advancing civil rights when there was little or no political gain in it for him, you might think, as I do, that a 2016 JFK would be running on marriage equality for all, on sentencing and drug war reform, on the right to choose, on fair labor and organizing practices, and on real environmental protection. Oh how I wish Republicans would embrace any of those ideals.
All old Republicans would be Democrats today. From Ike to Ford.
… you aren’t paying attention. That is absolutely a winning message. Property taxes are limited, and not just in Massachusetts, exactly because of this message. This message worked for Ed King. And it worked for Bill Weld and Mitt Romney. Worked for Ronald Reagan. Worked for George Bush.
The message, rarely, ever fails to ‘win’.
The problem isn’t that is is not a winning message, the problem is that it is not a possible message. It. cannot. be. done.
It has been tried. And it failed. It has been tried again, and if failed again. After that, it was, yet again, tried, and again it failed. It has the very DNA of failure. You cannot pit the government against the citizens who are the government, attempting to do so only causes more misery.
Was meant to be a downrate.
This may be a good description of the problem…
… but this is not at all a solution. Ballot initiatives (especially those that aren’t ‘initiated’ by anything other than what the lege does) are bad governance.
Personally, if I had one tenth the “passion, time, funding and organization”, that it would take to even contemplate a ballot initiative I would take every last ounce of all of it and. instead, pour it liberally into the Nineteenth Suffolk district, whose House Rep is currently Speaker. It would be money a thousand times over better spent. If Robert DeLeo wants to hold up the CommonWealth over his parochial outlook then it’s up to the entire CommonWealth to broaden his horizons. A ‘ballot initiatiative’ is about the least effective method of doing that.
You can get people to donate, volunteer, and sign petitions, for an issue they have a strong opinion about or really care about emotionally, but that does not mean you could get even a small fraction of that effort out of those same people for some other issue or campaign.
And they also take the will of the Legislature, which has shown a willingness to outright ignore them. The anti-bilingual education proposal passed 2-to-1, and the Legislature blew it off (which I agreed with, but what’s the legal rationale?).
We should probably eliminate ballot questions, or make them constitutionally binding. Given our system and the large General Court, I’d err on the side of eliminating them.
I think Sleeples nailed it by stating the two ballot initiatives should have been separate posts.
Regretfully, in a rush this morning, I posted the Globe’s pairing of the two “controversial” questions rather than parsing the article and subject matter with more diligence.
My bad.
I wish this post was just about one or the other, I’d prefer the gas tax and casinos to not be linked in anyone’s minds. Casinos stand on their own as a terrible idea that need to be repealed!
Regretfully, in a rush, I posted the Globe’s pairing of the two “controversial” questions rather than parsing the article and subject matter with more diligence.
My bad.
Thanks for all the work you’ve done here and it sounds like out there in the real world on this issue
I am eager to vote to negate the casino deal. It’s bad public policy, bad economic policy, and epitomizes the worst of Massachusetts politics.
Massachusetts desperately needs more tax revenue. The Governor’s original tax proposal should have been made law. The sales tax on service providers should have been fixed, not killed. The gas tax increase should have been done years ago.
The gas-tax referendum is another disaster-in-process (like Prop 2 1/2) whose harmful effects will reverberate far beyond the immediate issue. It should be soundly defeated.
I actually don’t mind linking them. Fiscal responsibility and real accountability demand that we seek to raise more revenue in a more progressive way. Casino’s are regressive in that they are a tax on the poor and their costs cannot be socialized. Gas taxes that rise automatically will ensure that our transit needs will be adequately funded while decreasing our carbon footprint. It also ensures that its no longer a political hot potato but a basic tool of prudent governance. And an automatic
Minimum wage increase would continue this trend!
The casino law. It is anti-poor, anti-addict, and anti-Democratic. We need real jobs and economic growth in our gateway communities. Casinos bring poverty, crime, and hopelessness to our cities and towns. Shame on our Governor for showing tasteless leadership when favoring casinos but disfavoring them for his own community. As a kid who grew up in a rough neighborhood, he should know that junkets, prostitution, and gun crimes are already bad enough in such areas. Why do we need more?