BREAKING: Connecticut Statewide Property Tax Proposed!
CTNewsJunkie.com
Article is Provided Below
If
you are a concerned homeowner or business owner who is already taxed to the
max, you may wish to contact your state representatives before this proposal gains feet and is walked to the floor of the
State legislature for a vote!
Find
Your Legislator, Members
BREAKING: Detroit on Brink ofBankruptcy Suspends Some Debt Payments
Will Some Connecticut Towns Follow?
Bridgeport named highest-taxed city |
WTNH.com Connecticut in
the country!
June
14, 2013
From:
The Federation of Connecticut Taxpayer Organizations
Contact: Susan Kniep, President
Website: http://ctact.org/
Email: fctopresident@aol.com
Telephone: 860-841-8032
Recently, the Federation reported on ……
The List of Lasts | Yankee Institute
for Public Policy
http://www.yankeeinstitute.org/2013/01/the-list-of-lasts/
- Barron’s rated Connecticut’s debt situation as the worst in the country in 2012 (Bary,
Andrew. “State of the States” Barron’s. August 27, 2012)
- TopRetirements.com ranked Connecticut as the 2012 worst
state for retirement(Murphy, Eamon. “The 10 Worst States to Retire In: They’re
Frosty and Costly” January 13, 2012. TopRetirements.com)
- The Institute for Truth in Accounting ranked Connecticut’s financial status as the worst
in the nation with
a debt burden of $49,000 per taxpayer (The Institute for Truth in
Accounting, “The Financial
State of the
States”)
- Connecticut’s credit quality was ranked 50th in
the nation by
Conning Inc’s State of the States Municipal
Credit Research Report in 2012 (Sturdevant, M.
“Connecticut Ranks Last Among 50 States in Credit Analysis by Conning”
Courant Blogs. November 27, 2012.)
- Connecticut’s
Tax Freedom Day of May 5, 2012 was the latest in the nation according to the Tax
Foundation (Tax Foundation Tax Freedom Day Study 2012)
- Connecticut’s Achievement Gap is the worst in the nation according to the Connecticut
Council for Education Reform
- The Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors
by the Cato Institute gave Gov. Dan Malloy an “F” (Edwards,
Chris. “Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors” October
9, 2012.)
***********************
Today, we are reporting…….
On June
5th it was reported A $2.1 billion plan for UConn moves forward | The CT Mirror noting
the majority of the money was to be bonded, while the state imposed More cuts for the state's community
colleges.
Today, Economists at the University of Connecticut recommended instituting
a Statewide Property Tax Pitched As
Solution To ECS Funding (read below) to
close more than $1 billion funding gap.
by Hugh McQuaid | Jun 14, 2013 11:34am CTNewsJunkie.com
Posted to: Education | Taxes
http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/ctnj.php/archives/entry/statewide_property_tax_pitched_as_solution_to_ecs_funding/
Economists
at the University
of Connecticut
recommended Thursday looking at instituting a statewide property tax to close
more than $1 billion funding gap in the state’s education cost sharing formula.
They
pitched that idea in their quarterly “Connecticut
Economy” report which was
released Thursday at the Connecticut Education
Association’s Hartford
offices.
Stan McMillen, a contributing economist, said that for the last
five fiscal years, the state has underfunded its
share of education funding to municipalities required by statute. He said when
increased special education costs and the costs of the school readiness program
are factored in, the shortfall totals around $1.09 billion.
In the
report, McMillen weighs several options including
increasing the state sales tax to 8.3 percent or hiking the income taxes by
13.8 percent. However, he spends much of the report discussing a more “outside
the box,” option in enacting a statewide property tax to pay for education.
Asked
about potential negative consequences of enacting a new tax, McMillen said it was a “pay me now or pay me later” issue.
“We’re underfunding by $1.09 billion. That’s going to have
downstream consequences,” he said.
McMillen said
the first thing companies looking to expand in a state look for is the
availability of qualified, educated workforce. He said if Connecticut does not adequately fund
education it will end up with an insufficient “pipeline” of workers as older residents age out of the workforce.
States
across the country are competing for the same jobs and shortfalls in education
funding impact Connecticut’s competitiveness, he said. He said the state’s
worst-in-the-nation achievement gap between low and high income family students
is well known in other states.
“We’re
competing for resources, we’re competing for jobs and the best way to generate
jobs is to make an investment in the pipeline. That’s what this is all about”
he said.
Steven
P. Lanza, executive editor of the report, said there
are arguments both for and against a statewide property tax. He said other
states in the area like Vermont and New Hampshire have
instituted a statewide tax.
“Nobody
likes to see taxes go up,” he said, but added economists were looking to find
the least burdensome way of closing the gap. “... What we’re trying to do
through funding ECS is to lift all boats and hopefully generate a skilled
workforce but we recognize that requires public investment to do that.”
As
opposed to increases in the sales tax or income tax, Lanza
said a property tax would be a more predictable source of revenue.
“Property
can’t get up and move so easily. So you know the tax base is going to stay
there and you can be pretty certain about the revenue that you’re going to
raise,” he said, adding that there could be negative secondary effects to
adding the tax.
Lanza said it
will not be easy for the state to raise an additional billion in revenue, but
he said it was imperative that the state find a way to fully fund education.
“Coming
up with a billion dollars is not easy to do, and yet it is a constitutional
mandate from the state Supreme Court saying we should be fully funding
education cost sharing and we’re not doing it,” he said. “This is sort of the
price tag to do it and it won’t be easy no matter how you slice it.”
McMillen said
the $1.89 billion currently dedicated toward ECS funding and funds generated by
the new tax should be taken out of the state’s General Fund, where it is
possible for the legislature to raid the money for other purpose.
“You
put it somewhere where the legislature can’t touch it and the state can
administer it more efficiently than the legislature can with the General Fund,”
he said.
Also
read ……..