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CLT UPDATE
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
House Budget Debate:
Tax cut amendments "inoculated" to avoid vote fingerprints
|
The Massachusetts House of Representatives killed
a Republican measure Monday to lower the state sales tax to 5
percent, instead voting 119 to 37, largely along party lines, to
send the proposal to a study commission.
The measure would have reduced the rate, phased
in over three years, beginning in July 2013. Three years ago,
lawmakers increased the sales tax from 5 percent to 6.25 percent.
The latest sales-tax question was the first
measure debated among 870 amendments filed to the House budget that
lawmakers began considering Monday. House members expect to vote on
the full $32.3 billion budget later this week.
The Boston Globe
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Mass. House rejects sales tax cut
GOP bill to lower sales levy set aside
First action on $32.3b budget
Speaker Robert DeLeo’s point-man on tax
legislation said Monday that DeLeo’s 2009 drive to raise the state
sales tax was done without a full “economic analysis.”
“I think that was a perfect example of the kind
of debate and kind of vote that I do not want to recreate,” said
Rep. Jay Kaufman (D-Lexington), House chairman of the Committee on
Revenue, during debate on the House’s annual budget proposal. “To
simply go back and cast another vote without that context would be
to make the mistakes of the past.”
For that reason, Kaufman argued that a proposal
by House Republicans to reduce the sales tax to its pre-2009 level
should be scuttled in favor of additional analysis and review. House
members agreed, voting 119-37 to study the issue further.
The study effectively killed an effort by House
Minority Leader Bradley Jones to phase in a sales tax break over the
next three years, returning it to 5 percent, its level before
lawmakers and Gov. Deval Patrick successfully ushered through a 25
percent hike. The current sales tax rate is 6.25 percent....
After the vote, Jones released a statement,
saying: “While Democrats felt no need to study a proposed increase
to the state sales tax just three years ago, my colleagues across
the aisle seem strangely insistent on studying the effects of a tax
rollback.” ...
House leaders busied themselves Monday – the
first of what is expected to be about four days of budget debate –
by reviving a strategy to kill Republican efforts to cut taxes
without actually asking members to take up-or-down votes on them,
votes that might become factors in the upcoming election season.
To avoid those recorded votes, House leaders –
with the support of rank-and-file Democrats – have taken to
attaching riders to amendments they oppose calling for additional
study. Republicans have dubbed those riders “inoculators” because
they preclude clean up-or-down votes. On Monday, the first three
Republican efforts to reduce taxes were inoculated.
“What will you do when that inoculator shows its
ugly head on your amendment that you care about?” wondered Rep.
George Peterson (R-Grafton). “It does not bode well for any of us as
we start on this budget debate. I hope that this is an anomaly and
not going to continue. But somehow I doubt that.”
Rep. Donald Humason (R-Westfield) also ripped the
use of inoculators.
“Constituents are often cynical about what we do
in government,” he said. “It'd be one thing if you further amend
something and a study is actually done. We all know about
inoculation. We all know it's a tactic used in this House.”
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
Kaufman: 2009 sales tax hike lacked 'economic analysis'
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
State Capitol Briefs – Afternoon Edition
Members withdrawing budget amendments at speedy clip
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House Budget Notebook
House breezes through 225 budget amendments on first day of
debate
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House Budget Notebook
House rejects call for audit of state issued credit cards
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House Budget Notebook
DeLeo team again turns to "innoculators" on tax proposals
State House News Service
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
State Capitol Briefs – Lunch Edition
Veteran Rep: House processing budget with uncommon speed
The House on Monday night approved a
significant overhaul of the state’s Community Preservation Act,
voting unanimously for an amendment to the state budget that
could double the funding available to cities and towns in what
supporters hailed as a vote for local aid and jobs....
Kulik said the reform would make the CPA,
first passed and signed into law in 2000 under Gov. Paul
Cellucci, more attractive to densely populated communities by
expanding the acceptable uses for CPA funds, and giving cities
more flexibility in how they raise funds.
The Community Preservation Act allows
municipalities to assess a surcharge of up to 3 percent on
property tax bills to fund open space preservation, housing or
historic rehabilitation projects. Though the state matched
community generated funds at 100 percent at the program’s
inception, that percentage has dwindled to about 22 percent.
The amendment adopted Monday would
potentially double the amount of state funding available to
provide matches to cities and towns by allocating up to $25
million in surplus revenue from the fiscal 2012 budget to the
community preservation trust fund. Currently, funding comes from
fees collected on deeds and totals close to $26 million a year.
The proposal would also allow cities and
towns to use CPA funding to rehabilitate existing parks,
playgrounds and athletic fields, rather than only build new
ones, and gives communities flexibility to use revenue sources
aside from a property tax surcharge to fund their community
preservation accounts.
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House adopts reforms to CPA to expand use and funding for
preservation
The House has approved an expansion of the
Community Preservation Act as part of its budget deliberations,
and while we hate to interrupt the celebration the move does
raise questions that really ought to be on every taxpayer’s
mind....
The measure would also allow cities and towns
to expand the use of CPA funds, which are derived from a surtax
on property tax bills. Some communities have felt hamstrung by
restrictions, and this would allow them to use CPA funds not
just to build new parks and athletic fields but to rehabilitate
existing ones. Altogether that seems sensible, but raises the
question of why cities and towns have to rely on a separate
property tax to fund what should be part of their regular
operating budgets.
A Boston Herald editorial
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Community questions
Nothing to see here folks, move along.
That’s the new mantra of the state’s
Democratic leadership.
And you’ll be hearing a lot more of it today,
if the House of Representatives takes up the proposed reforms in
the EBT card program. EBT, of course, stands for Everybody But
Taxpayers. Anyone opposed to putting a halt to the fraud will be
dismissed as mean-spirited, racist, xenophobic, or all of the
above....
Today, those mean-spirited solons will likely
mention how 20,000 of the EBT cards go missing each month. But
if we take them away from Deval’s constituents, what will they
have to use as collateral in their heroin deals with illegal
aliens? I know, nothing to see here ...
The Democrats have so many scandals to avert
their eyes from, they must be getting sore necks from turning
their heads so often.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
‘Nothing to see’ mantra costly
By Howie Carr
The Telegram & Gazette
Sunday, April 22, 2011
Editorial cartoon by David Hitch
A Lowell man arrested Friday with nearly a
half-pound of heroin was also carrying an EBT card belonging to
a known drug user — a card that may have been collateral for a
drug debt, police and prosecutors believe.
Campeo A. Diaz-Carela, 43, is facing a
minimum mandatory 15 years in prison if found guilty of
trafficking heroin over 200 grams, the charge he was arraigned
on yesterday in Salem District Court.
Diaz-Carela was also arraigned on charges of
giving police a false name, after initially producing
identification that showed him as Abisay Montanez, 36. Among the
documents Diaz-Carela was carrying were a MassHealth card, a
Pennsylvania identification card and a learner's permit, all
bearing the name Montanez.
But police also found an electronic benefits
transfer card that belongs to a Beverly resident known to police
as a regular heroin user, prosecutor Patrick Collins told a
Salem District Court judge....
It wasn't until Diaz-Carela's fingerprints
were submitted to an FBI database that he was identified — and
discovered to be wanted by immigration officials, as well,
having entered the country illegally through Arizona in 2010,
Collins said.
The Salem News
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Police: Drug suspect had man's EBT card
After two days of debate, the House had
dispensed with more than half of the 870 amendments filed to the
$32.3 billion Ways and Means budget for fiscal 2013 blasting
through 474 amendments on Monday and Tuesday with some of the
issues expected to generate the fiercest debate over immigration
and welfare benefits still to come.
On Tuesday, the House adopted five omnibus or
“consolidated amendments” crafted largely out of the public eye
dealing with the topics of housing and social services,
transportation, energy and environmental affairs, veterans and
soldiers homes, and mental health.
The debate in the House ground to a halt
after a dinner break on Tuesday with members spending much of
the evening talking with each other in the chamber as they
waited to see what type of compromise House leadership would
reach with representatives ...
The House is due to resume its debate at 10
a.m., with the first roll calls coming at 11 a.m.
State House News Service
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
House Budget Notebook – Evening Edition
House more than half-way through amendments after Day Two
|
|
Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
There's a lot of news to digest, so I'll keep my
comments brief.
House Democrats quickly dispatched Republican
budget amendments to roll back the sales tax and other savings for
taxpayers, making them disappear into oblivion. There is a new term
now in the lexicon of legislators for when they don't want to be
caught taking a vote that could be used against them: they call it
"inoculation."
It inoculates them from being held accountable by
their constituents.
The Dems couldn't possibly consider rolling back
the sales tax — not without careful
analysis of the effect, something that wasn't bothered with when
it was hiked. Somehow,
jacking up taxes never require analysis in
Massachusetts — only tax cuts
do, what they now prefer to call "tax expenditures."
Things are happening fast on Bacon Hill this week
during the House $32.3 billion budget debate. “In all the years I’ve
been here, that is the fastest,” Rep. James Miceli (D-Wilmington)
told the State House News Service yesterday.
One of the amendments adopted changes the
Community Preservation Act, allowing municipalities to spend CPA
override money more freely, on things that rightly should be funded
by a city's or town's general revenue —
a slip down the slippery slope.
Rep. Shaunna O'Connell's and others amendment
(#804) to take a shot real reform of the EBT card fiasco is
expected to be voted on today.
That is — unless it too
is "inoculated" into obscurity.
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Chip Ford |
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The Boston Globe
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Mass. House rejects sales tax cut
GOP bill to lower sales levy set aside
First action on $32.3b budget
By Noah Bierman
The Massachusetts House of Representatives killed a Republican
measure Monday to lower the state sales tax to 5 percent, instead
voting 119 to 37, largely along party lines, to send the proposal to
a study commission.
The measure would have reduced the rate, phased in over three years,
beginning in July 2013. Three years ago, lawmakers increased the
sales tax from 5 percent to 6.25 percent.
The latest sales-tax question was the first measure debated among
870 amendments filed to the House budget that lawmakers began
considering Monday. House members expect to vote on the full $32.3
billion budget later this week. The Senate will take up its own
budget proposal in June. The chambers will negotiate any differences
before sending a compromise to Governor Deval Patrick in time for
the next budget year to begin in July.
On Monday, many House amendments were dismissed with a voice vote,
including a measure from Quincy Democrat Tackey Chan to eliminate
the sales tax on plug-in hybrid vehicles, which Chan said he
proposed to stimulate interest in the new technology.
House leaders spent much of their time Monday in private
conversations, hashing out which amendments would get a public
debate and which would not. A number of measures were rolled into
two packages hours before they were to be voted on.
When the House budget was approved by the Ways and Means Committee
earlier this month, that vote was closed to the public.
Republicans Monday were eager to force a vote on several measures to
reduce taxes in an election year. But Democrats, who have
overwhelming control of the House, used a procedural tactic to kill
several tax-cut measures without a recorded vote, voting instead to
set them aside for study.
House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo was determined to avoid including any
new fees or taxes in the House budget proposal this year, even as
Governor Deval Patrick had written some into his budget plan.
Representative Bradley H. Jones Jr., the House Republican leader
from North Reading, urged fellow representatives to consider
lowering the sales tax to 5 percent because “the idea of reform and
efficiency goes out the window’’ when lawmakers have more money to
spend.
“The beginning of the debate should always be: It’s not our money to
begin with,’’ he said. “It’s somebody else’s.’’
But Representative Jay Kaufman, a Lexington Democrat who leads the
House revenue committee, said tax cuts would mean fewer teachers,
firefighters, and other state services. He said he agreed the sales
tax is a regressive one, but he nonetheless refused to support a
rollback.
“We are talking about draconian cuts to public services,’’ Kaufman
said, adding that previous tax changes, including the 2009 sales tax
increase favored by Democrats, were approved without enough study on
their broad impacts to businesses and government services.
Kaufman and other Democrats also opposed a measure that would have
raised the cigarette tax by $.50 a pack. The money from that tax
would have been used to support the Massachusetts Bay Transportation
Authority, which recently raised fares. To keep the price of
cigarettes from increasing, the measure would also have reduced the
state’s mandated minimum price for cigarettes.
That measure, sponsored by Norfolk Republican Daniel B. Winslow, was
also sent for study.
Winslow said he believes Democrats from Boston missed an opportunity
to help MBTA riders avoid some of the coming fare hike, but were
pressured to oppose his measure because it was not backed by the
Democrats who lead the House.
“It’s not in the script,’’ he said. “This is a highly orchestrated
process.’’
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
Kaufman: 2009 sales tax hike lacked 'economic analysis'
By Kyle Cheney
Speaker Robert DeLeo’s point-man on tax legislation said Monday that
DeLeo’s 2009 drive to raise the state sales tax was done without a
full “economic analysis.”
“I think that was a perfect example of the kind of debate and kind
of vote that I do not want to recreate,” said Rep. Jay Kaufman
(D-Lexington), House chairman of the Committee on Revenue, during
debate on the House’s annual budget proposal. “To simply go back and
cast another vote without that context would be to make the mistakes
of the past.”
For that reason, Kaufman argued that a proposal by House Republicans
to reduce the sales tax to its pre-2009 level should be scuttled in
favor of additional analysis and review. House members agreed,
voting 119-37 to study the issue further.
The study effectively killed an effort by House Minority Leader
Bradley Jones to phase in a sales tax break over the next three
years, returning it to 5 percent, its level before lawmakers and
Gov. Deval Patrick successfully ushered through a 25 percent hike.
The current sales tax rate is 6.25 percent.
The debate took place before a largely empty House chamber, with
most Democrats opting to exit the room while about half of the
Republican caucus remained on hand.
“It's not our money to begin with. It might be a corporation, it
might be an individual. But it's not our money to begin with,” Jones
said. “Every time we take that money, we have to justify using the
power of the state to reach into someone's pocket to take that
money.”
Jones argued persistent examples of government waste warrant
immediate consideration of tax reductions and a further focus on
cost-saving measures, rather than efforts to wring additional
revenue out of taxpayers.
“One need look no further than the headlines in the newspaper the
last week to know that there are any number of examples of places we
could have efficiencies, economies and tighten the state's belt
fiscally,” he said.
But Kaufman retorted that Jones’s argument was a ruse.
“Forget that. It is not where we need to go,” he said. “It is an
excuse to avoid a more fundamental debate about our values.”
Kaufman contended that the issues amounted to a dichotomy rooted in
American history: the westward-traveling pioneers hoping to keep
government from impeding their progress, and the pilgrims who signed
the Mayflower Compact, vowing that “we’re all in this together.”
“Those two narratives are what make up the American character,” he
said. “There will always be debates about whether taxes are too high
or too low.”
After the vote, Jones released a statement, saying: “While Democrats
felt no need to study a proposed increase to the state sales tax
just three years ago, my colleagues across the aisle seem strangely
insistent on studying the effects of a tax rollback.”
House leaders busied themselves Monday – the first of what is
expected to be about four days of budget debate – by reviving a
strategy to kill Republican efforts to cut taxes without actually
asking members to take up-or-down votes on them, votes that might
become factors in the upcoming election season.
To avoid those recorded votes, House leaders – with the support of
rank-and-file Democrats – have taken to attaching riders to
amendments they oppose calling for additional study. Republicans
have dubbed those riders “inoculators” because they preclude clean
up-or-down votes. On Monday, the first three Republican efforts to
reduce taxes were inoculated.
“What will you do when that inoculator shows its ugly head on your
amendment that you care about?” wondered Rep. George Peterson
(R-Grafton). “It does not bode well for any of us as we start on
this budget debate. I hope that this is an anomaly and not going to
continue. But somehow I doubt that.”
Rep. Donald Humason (R-Westfield) also ripped the use of
inoculators.
“Constituents are often cynical about what we do in government,” he
said. “It'd be one thing if you further amend something and a study
is actually done. We all know about inoculation. We all know it's a
tactic used in this House.”
House members voted 113-38 to seek further study on a proposal to
exempt cities and towns from the state’s 23.5-cent gas tax, a
proposal Republicans said would cost between $6 million and $12
million a year for state government. Critics said the proposal
lacked the kind of analysis called for in a newly released
commission’s report recommending greater review of tax deductions
and exemptions.
The House also voted 93-63 to further study an amendment offered by
Rep. Jay Barrows (R-Mansfield) that would reduce the state sales tax
on cell phones purchased at discount rates. Currently, Barrows
argued, cell phones are taxed at their retail value, even if
consumers purchase them at sharply reduced rates. That means that a
phone company offering a $500 phone for $50 is required to collect
sales tax based on the original price of the phone.
One amendment, offered by Rep. Shaunna O’Connell (R-Taunton) to
establish a meals tax holiday from Oct. 7 to Oct. 12, received a
direct vote: Democrats defeated it on a largely party line 36-116
vote. O’Connell said the holiday would coincide with a down season
for the hospitality industry.
While O’Connell argued the holiday from the state meals tax would
encourage spending in local restaurants, helping small business
owners and generating more tax revenue through increased tourism,
Kaufman said studies suggest such holidays simply shift spending,
and do not create any additional economic activity.
Rep. Marty Walz (D-Boston) also said a meals tax holiday would
siphon tax revenue away from local aid that gets sent back to cities
and towns, and Rep. Sarah Peake, who owns a bed-and-breakfast on
Cape Cod, urged her colleagues to reject the amendment in favor of
other proposals to be debated later increasing funding for regional
tourism councils and highway tourist information centers.
Rep. Marc Lombardo (R-Billerica) took exception to Kaufman calling
the amendment a “gimmick,” calling the proposal a matter of fairness
because restaurants cannot take advantage of what has become an
annual tradition of giving retailers a sales tax holiday in August
for the back-to-school shopping season. Opponents of the August
sales tax holiday have long argued that it merely shifts economic
activity.
Matt Murphy contributed reporting
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
State Capitol Briefs – Afternoon Edition
Members withdrawing budget amendments at speedy clip
If any House members were girding for debate on the 36 revenue
amendments filed to the fiscal 2013 budget, they were out of luck.
More than 21 of the 36 proposals were withdrawn before they were
considered, another two were re-categorized to different areas of
the budget. Of the remaining 13, most were passed or rejected
rapidly without explanation or discussion, a handful were debated
but ultimately referred for further study without up-or-down votes,
and just one -- a proposed meals tax holiday -- received a direct
roll call vote. That amendment was defeated 36-116. Overall, 43 of
the 870 amendments to the budget were withdrawn on the first day of
debate, according to the House's budget web site.
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House Budget Notebook
House breezes through 225 budget amendments on first day of debate
With only a handful of pauses for debate, House members sped through
consideration of 225 amendments to the proposed state budget,
continuing a years-old trend in which the bulk of deliberation is
done behind closed doors.
Members backed without debate two leadership-supported "consolidated
amendments" that melded together batches of amendments on the same
topics: education and local aid, as well as constitutional officers
and state administration. Those consolidated amendments added about
$17 million to the proposed budget's $32.3 billion bottom line.
Members also dispensed with 35 amendments affecting the state's
projected revenue take next fiscal year, with 21 being withdrawn
before they were considered by the House and most of the others --
including Republican-backed tax cuts -- rejected.
Members also withdrew about two dozen additional amendments on other
topics yet to be debated. Overall, members filed 870 amendments to
the state budget. House members anticipate consideration of another
63-amendment batch early Tuesday, when they'll receive copies of a
consolidated amendment on housing and social services.
However, amendments dealing with welfare cash benefits --
anticipated to be among the most hotly debated topics during this
week's budget debate -- were stripped from that category and will be
considered separately, House leaders told colleagues as Monday's
session neared conclusion. Twenty-nine transportation amendments
will be merged into a consolidated amendment later Monday morning,
House officials said. The House is set to resume debate Tuesday at
10 a.m., with roll call votes slated for 11 a.m....
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House Budget Notebook
House rejects call for audit of state issued credit cards
The House made its first foray into concerns over the abuse of
welfare cash benefits Monday evening, rejecting a proposal to
require the State Auditor to account for state-funded credit cards
distributed by any agency or quasi-public authority.
The amendment's sponsor, Rep. Shaunna O'Connell (R-Taunton), said
the measure was intended to show that the state Legislature is
"serious about being watchdogs" of taxpayer dollars and preventing
abuse that deprives legitimate benefit recipients of state support.
Rep. Stephen Kulik (D-Worthington) urged colleagues to reject the
measure, calling it "not necessary" because of efforts that State
Auditor Suzanne Bump had made to catalogue issues with welfare cash
benefits since she took office last year.
The House rejected the amendment 40-114, with a handful of Democrats
joining the 33-member Republican caucus in support.
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House Budget Notebook
DeLeo team again turns to "innoculators" on tax proposals
House leaders showed no appetite Monday afternoon for roll call
votes on a slew of Republican tax-cutting amendments. Returning to
an oft-used tactic to avoid up-or-down votes on those amendments,
House Democrats “further amendments” onto the GOP-backed proposals.
Those further amendments call for additional study of the underlying
amendment. Republican lawmakers have referred to those further
amendments as “inoculators” because they prevent roll call votes on
the Republicans’ amendments.
The first three debated amendments of the fiscal 2013 budget cycle –
to cut the sales tax, to exempt municipalities from the gas tax and
to reduce the sales tax on cell phones – were all inoculated by
House leaders.
State House News Service
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
State Capitol Briefs – Lunch Edition
Veteran Rep: House processing budget with uncommon speed
In the 35 years since he joined the House, veteran Rep. James Miceli
of Wilmington says he’s never seen the House whisk through
amendments as quickly as it has over the past 24 hours.
The House dispensed with 225 of its 870 amendments on Monday, the
opening day of deliberations on a $32.3 billion spending plan, and
was working largely behind the scenes Tuesday on amendments dealing
with housing, social services, energy, the environment and
transportation.
“In all the years I’ve been here, that is the fastest,” Miceli told
the News Service Tuesday morning.
Miceli said the budget assembled by the House Ways and Means
Committee was “well put-together” and that committee co-chair Rep.
Brian Dempsey had done a “good job.” The budget features investments
in education and local aid spending as well as additional funding
for elder services and restrictions on inappropriate spending by
public assistance recipients.
“Most of the people that are sitting in that chamber feel that it’s
something they can run on,” Miceli said.
State House News Service
Monday, April 23, 2012
House adopts reforms to CPA to expand use and funding for
preservation
By Matt Murphy
The House on Monday night approved a significant overhaul of the
state’s Community Preservation Act, voting unanimously for an
amendment to the state budget that could double the funding
available to cities and towns in what supporters hailed as a vote
for local aid and jobs.
The vote for the amendment, sponsored by Rep. Stephen Kulik
(D-Worthington), was unanimous, with Rep. Timothy Madden, a
Nantucket Democrat, calling it the most important vote the House
took all night.
“This is, by all means, in my opinion, the most important bill we
are doing tonight. It's a jobs bill. It creates affordable housing,”
Madden said.
Kulik said the reform would make the CPA, first passed and signed
into law in 2000 under Gov. Paul Cellucci, more attractive to
densely populated communities by expanding the acceptable uses for
CPA funds, and giving cities more flexibility in how they raise
funds.
The Community Preservation Act allows municipalities to assess a
surcharge of up to 3 percent on property tax bills to fund open
space preservation, housing or historic rehabilitation projects.
Though the state matched community generated funds at 100 percent at
the program’s inception, that percentage has dwindled to about 22
percent.
The amendment adopted Monday would potentially double the amount of
state funding available to provide matches to cities and towns by
allocating up to $25 million in surplus revenue from the fiscal 2012
budget to the community preservation trust fund. Currently, funding
comes from fees collected on deeds and totals close to $26 million a
year.
The proposal would also allow cities and towns to use CPA funding to
rehabilitate existing parks, playgrounds and athletic fields, rather
than only build new ones, and gives communities flexibility to use
revenue sources aside from a property tax surcharge to fund their
community preservation accounts.
The proposal’s odds of reaching Gov. Deval Patrick’s desk appear
strong: a pending bill that closely mirrors the House amendment has
26 Senate cosponsors, enough to assure passage if it reaches the
Senate floor.
Rep. Sarah Peake, a Provincetown Democrat, invited her colleagues to
the Cape this summer to take in a Cape Cod League baseball game at
fields that she said communities would be able to be renovate and
maintain thanks to the vote taken by the House Monday.
“This is truly a win, win, win,” Peake said. The amendment had
bipartisan backing with House Minority Leader Brad Jones and
Republican Rep. Angelo D'Emilia, of Bridgewater, speaking in support
during the debate, and Rep. Paul Schmid, a Westport Democrat, gave
his maiden speech on the issue.
Though state tax collections are running about $87 million below
projections through March, advocates said they believed the increase
funding would be available for fiscal 2013.
“In an improving economy, we’re very hopeful there will be a
significant amount of funding to do these projects,” said Stuart
Saginor, executive director of the Community Preservation Coalition.
The amendment also created an exemption for small businesses similar
to the ones available for seniors and low-income residents that
would allow communities to exempt business owners from the CPA
property tax surcharge on the first $100,000 of property value.
“This is monumental what happened tonight. It’s really a job
creation bill and another form of local aid,” said Robert Durand, a
former House and Senate member and the author of the state’s
original Community Preservation Act.
Saginor said after trying to get a bill through the House and Senate
over the past three sessions, there is “tremendous excitement” among
communities for the increased flexibility to raise and use CPA
funds, and he said the changes will also make the program more
attractive to the 203 municipalities that have not yet adopted the
Community Preservation Act.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
A Boston Herald editorial
Community questions
The House has approved an expansion of the Community Preservation
Act as part of its budget deliberations, and while we hate to
interrupt the celebration the move does raise questions that really
ought to be on every taxpayer’s mind.
For starters there’s the issue of approving the policy changes not
just via the state budget — but via an amendment to the state
budget. Unless you have a pet interest in open space and housing
issues you likely have no idea what transpired in the House chamber
on Monday.
The proposal would first boost the amount of state funding available
to those cities and towns that adopt the provisions of the Community
Preservation Act. While state-matching funds flowed in the early
days after the law passed, they have ebbed with the economic tide.
This measure would divert up to $25 million in any potential surplus
from the current fiscal year to help cities and towns meet their
preservation goals.
And those goals may well be laudable, but isn’t this the very same
budget proposal that drains $400 million out of the rainy-day fund?
If there’s a surplus, every last drop of it should go to offset any
previous draw on reserves.
The measure would also allow cities and towns to expand the use of
CPA funds, which are derived from a surtax on property tax bills.
Some communities have felt hamstrung by restrictions, and this would
allow them to use CPA funds not just to build new parks and athletic
fields but to rehabilitate existing ones. Altogether that seems
sensible, but raises the question of why cities and towns have to
rely on a separate property tax to fund what should be part of their
regular operating budgets.
Supporters of the measure called it a “jobs bill” because it will
create new affordable housing. But the truth is over the decade-plus
life of the CPA cities and towns have raised more than $1 billion in
local and state community preservation funds — while creating (or
“supporting”) all of 5,100 housing units. Many communities have
chosen instead to snatch up open space and prevent new housing
development. Something tells us this “jobs bill” won’t lead to full
employment for the building trades.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
‘Nothing to see’ mantra costly
By Howie Carr
Nothing to see here folks, move along.
That’s the new mantra of the state’s Democratic leadership.
And you’ll be hearing a lot more of it today, if the House of
Representatives takes up the proposed reforms in the EBT card
program. EBT, of course, stands for Everybody But Taxpayers. Anyone
opposed to putting a halt to the fraud will be dismissed as
mean-spirited, racist, xenophobic, or all of the above.
After all, these layabouts are merely seeking a “modest benefit,” as
Deval Patrick — who hasn’t seen anything in years as he moves along
— put it Monday.
Granted, it’s only Wednesday, but so far the EBT “anecdote” of the
week comes from Beverly. Here’s the lead from the Salem News: “A
Lowell man arrested Friday with nearly a half-pound of heroin was
also carrying an EBT card belonging to a known drug user.”
A Lowell man indeed. The suspect allegedly entered the country
illegally in 2010. And when lugged, he had not only an EBT card but
a MassHealth card, the paper reported.
Nothing to see here folks.
Today, those mean-spirited solons will likely mention how 20,000 of
the EBT cards go missing each month. But if we take them away from
Deval’s constituents, what will they have to use as collateral in
their heroin deals with illegal aliens? I know, nothing to see here
...
The Democrats have so many scandals to avert their eyes from, they
must be getting sore necks from turning their heads so often.
Such as the cover-up of Lt. Gov. Crash Murray’s mystery 108 mph
traffic accident, and the stonewalling in the governor’s office over
releasing Crash Murray’s cellphone records.
Repeat after me: Nothing to see here folks, move along.
Or how the state refuses to participate in Secure Communities — it’s
more important not to round up violent illegal aliens (and their EBT
cards) than it is to protect American citizens. Remember, every
deported illegal is one less vote for Barack in the fall.
So much not to see, so little space.
Granny Warren’s no-interest loan from Harvard — just what a one-percenter
making $350,000 a year needs, right?
Monday, in the House, the Republicans tried to roll back Deval’s 25
percent sales tax increase. The Democrats wanted a “study.” The
Republicans pointed out there was no study when the rate was jacked
up. That’s right, said the Democrats, and we don’t want to make the
same mistake twice, wink, wink, nudge, nudge.
Nothing to see here ...
The Salem News
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Police: Drug suspect had man's EBT card
By Julie Manganis
BEVERLY — A Lowell man arrested Friday with nearly a half-pound of
heroin was also carrying an EBT card belonging to a known drug user
— a card that may have been collateral for a drug debt, police and
prosecutors believe.
Campeo A. Diaz-Carela, 43, is facing a minimum mandatory 15 years in
prison if found guilty of trafficking heroin over 200 grams, the
charge he was arraigned on yesterday in Salem District Court.
Diaz-Carela was also arraigned on charges of giving police a false
name, after initially producing identification that showed him as
Abisay Montanez, 36. Among the documents Diaz-Carela was carrying
were a MassHealth card, a Pennsylvania identification card and a
learner's permit, all bearing the name Montanez.
But police also found an electronic benefits transfer card that
belongs to a Beverly resident known to police as a regular heroin
user, prosecutor Patrick Collins told a Salem District Court judge.
Collins said EBT cards, which have come under scrutiny recently over
their misuse, are now being handed over to dealers by addicts.
It wasn't until Diaz-Carela's fingerprints were submitted to an FBI
database that he was identified — and discovered to be wanted by
immigration officials, as well, having entered the country illegally
through Arizona in 2010, Collins said.
Beverly Patrolman Thomas Nolan was working near the North Beverly
Plaza when he noticed a Chrysler Pacifica passing slowly and looking
at him.
Nolan took down the plate number and learned it was registered to a
woman in Lynn whom he knew from prior investigations to be a "straw"
buyer for a drug dealer, Collins told Judge Robert Brennan.
Nolan followed the Pacifica to Beverly Commons Drive, not far from
the shopping plaza, near Tozer Road, and saw two men get out, one
with his hand on a pocket knife attached to his belt.
As both men approached, Nolan pulled out a can of pepper spray. At
first, the man with the pocket knife appeared to be cooperative but
then ran off, throwing items from his pockets as he ran, according
to the police report.
Nolan caught up with the man, as backup arrived.
Police found a package wrapped in foil, about 7 inches by 5 inches,
that was filled with chunks of brown matter believed to be 220 grams
(7.8 ounces) of heroin, worth about $30,000.
Because of the combination of a likely mandatory minimum sentence
and Diaz-Carela's immigration status, Brennan granted Collins'
request for $500,000 cash bail.
A status hearing is scheduled for May 15.
State House News Service
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
House Budget Notebook – Evening Edition
House more than half-way through amendments after Day Two
After two days of debate, the House had dispensed with more than
half of the 870 amendments filed to the $32.3 billion Ways and Means
budget for fiscal 2013 blasting through 474 amendments on Monday and
Tuesday with some of the issues expected to generate the fiercest
debate over immigration and welfare benefits still to come.
On Tuesday, the House adopted five omnibus or “consolidated
amendments” crafted largely out of the public eye dealing with the
topics of housing and social services, transportation, energy and
environmental affairs, veterans and soldiers homes, and mental
health.
The debate in the House ground to a halt after a dinner break on
Tuesday with members spending much of the evening talking with each
other in the chamber as they waited to see what type of compromise
House leadership would reach with representatives ...
The House is due to resume its debate at 10 a.m., with the first
roll calls coming at 11 a.m.
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