The "Taxpayer Protection and Government Accountability Act" attempts to give voters more power in the process when state and local leaders raise taxes and fees. The measure requires voters to have final approval on future taxes and fees imposed by state and local governments and would also cancel new taxes and fees imposed starting in 2022 unless approved by voters within a year of the act going into effect.
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Yeah, I can see why Newsom doesn't want it on the ballot. Who would want to kill that cash cow?
Colorado passed TABOR (Taxpayer Bill of Rights) that sounds similar, and the politicians have constantly tried to find ways to gut it, work around it, or find some way to keep the money...so far all of which have failed. Most recently, they tried to bury gutting it in with some other tax cuts but, amazingly, the voters were smart enough to read past the first line and figure out that it wasn't in their best interest.
ReplyDeleteColorado has something similar called TABOR (Taxpayer Bill Of Rights). Conservatives and many liberal voters love it. Tax and spend liberal politicians hate it and are constantly devising schemes to get rid of it.
ReplyDeleteRestricting tax authority is why California public employee unions and their pet politicians hate Prop 13 with a white-hot passion. Just about every election there is another proposal to trim the edges of NO reassessments if the property hasn't changed hands. The last round tried to exclude commercial properties with the excuse that businesses can afford to pay more property taxes.
ReplyDeleteIt got voted down..
Well, Californians voted against repealing the high gas tax. The ballot question was something like "Do you want us to keep fixing the roads?" California voters are some of the dumbest in the country next to Massachusetts.
ReplyDeletePretty much everyone who *actually* voted to keep the tax probably has or plans to buy a BEV so they don't pay the tax anyway. Now, propose adding a registration fee based on miles driven each year for BEVs and the Tesla-ites will shoot that down in a heartbeat.
DeletePut Minnesota up there, too.
Delete"Do you want us to keep fixing the roads?"
DeleteThe TV advertisements in support of the proposition had a fireman wearing his turnout coat making the claim that if California voters approved a 12¢ increase in the gasoline tax, a 20¢ increase in the diesel tax and an increase in vehicle registration fees the revenues raised would improve roads so much that our brave first responders could get to emergencies more quickly. And the voters bought it.
That's what you call California Weapons Grade Stupidity.
BTW, attempting to raise vehicle registration fees is exactly what got Gray Davis recalled 15 years earlier. That and the power situation in CA.
Voters have too much power to let them control California.
ReplyDeleteTaxes and fees keep the riff raff in their places.
There already is a fix for that here in Colorado. Call everything 'fees'.
ReplyDeleteProblem solved.
With all three Colorado Supreme Court 'Justices" died in the wool (P)regressives that will be hard to beat.
DeleteI haven't read the article. The state has been wanting to kill Jarvis' Prop 13 since inception. In the last ten years or so, the state has doubled down on that effort. Huge influx of new voters, the majority are renters, is plus for the state.
ReplyDeleteOkay, I read the article. As I thought, this is part of a two pronged strategy. This effort is basically an end run around Prop 13. The other is to continue in the attempt to kill Prop 13.
ReplyDeleteJon Coupal of Howard Jarvis is a tireless warrior. He's the real deal.
One of the few things Texas does right. New taxes must be approved by a statewide vote, not just by a bunch of legislators. That's one reason there's not a state income tax. You'd have to get the entire state to approve it. But it always bothered me that I was asked to vote on whether a county 600 miles away from me could add 0.02% to the county sales tax so they could afford to add a constable to their payroll.
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