MUTH’S TRUTHS

SB 141 was a bill to increase the real estate property transfer tax, along with others, on Washoe County residents to pay for school construction projects. It was killed a few weeks ago by a vote of 8-13. Five of the eight votes were cast by Republicans, none of whom signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge promising not to do so (there’s a lesson here!). But the Great Washoe County Tax Hike of 2007 was resurrected in the Assembly by being attached as an amendment to another bill (SB 154), which passed with five Republican votes.

One of those votes was cast by Assemblyman John Marvel, a serial tax-hiker who signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge last year out of political convenience (his primary opponent had signed it), not conviction.

Note: If all 15 Republicans had stuck together and voted against this tax hike, it wouldn’t have met the 2/3 requirement and would have been killed a second time. The Republicans who kept the tax hike alive by voting for the bill were Assemblymen Carpenter, Goicoechea, Grady, Hardy and Marvel. Again, only Marvel had signed the tax pledge. So next year, when you hear Republican candidates say they don’t need to sign the Pledge - that we should just “trust them” - keep this in mind.

Anyway, that Assembly vote sent the bill back over to the Senate, where it passed on a party-line vote.

No, not with all the Democrats voting FOR the effort to raise taxes and all the Republicans voting AGAINST the effort to raise taxes. The other way around.

All 11 Republicans voted FOR the effort to raise taxes - including the four Taxpayer Protection Pledge signers: Sens. Beers, Cegavske, Hardy and Washington - and all the Democrats, even Sen. Titus, voted AGAINST it.

Sen. Beers’ flip-flop in voting for this effort to raise taxes is particularly troublesome, not the least of which is due to the fact that he is the CHAIRMAN of the Taxpayer Protection Pledge Caucus in the Nevada Legislature…kinda like the warden of a prison getting caught shoplifting.

It was only a month ago that Sen. Beers wrote in opposition to this tax hike effort in his blog, noting that the Washoe County School District’s student population had grown by some 25 percent over the last ten years, while its expenditures per pupil had exploded by 50 percent.

“Property tax collections and governmental services tax revenues (which fund school construction) have more than doubled over the last 10 years, but that’s still not enough,” Sen. Beers wrote with sarcasm dripping from his keyboard. “These tax revenues have grown about four times as fast as the student population, and they (school district officials) still say they need more.”

Sen. Beers added that “The (current) property tax collections will grow substantially over the next ten years, and should be sufficient to satisfy the needs of the school district.” He concluded his blog entry with this: “Another hat tip to (Assemblyman) Ty Cobb for being the only Washoe County legislator not to sign on to the WCSD’s proposal to increase the real property transfer taxes again. From 2003, I know how much guts it takes to stand up to legislative peer pressure.”

Alas, it appears Sen. Beers himself succumbed to just that pressure this time around.

Anyway, it’s now in the Governor’s hands. Will he, as he promised, veto this effort to raise taxes? Sure hope so. If the Legislature is hell-bent on raising taxes, let them override his veto. If they don’t, and THE PEOPLE really want to raise taxes on themselves, they can always circulate a petition and gather signatures to put the tax hikes on the ballot themselves…just like Gov. Gibbons and Sen. Beers did respectively to get their tax restraint and spending control proposals on the ballot.

There’s just no reason for the Governor, who has been a rock of consistency on his “no new taxes” pledge to this point, to break it now.

Posted on June 4th, 2007 by Chuck Muth
Filed under: Nevada