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Thread: The Penny

  1. #1
    Member ReformWNY's Avatar
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    The Penny

    People have spoken out hard on the penny proposal, yet it seems it is once again rearing its head. This discussion deserves its own thread I think as it is the biggest issue on the table right now and should have its own thread. I've made very broad statments about this before... so I'll try to at the very least summarize and reiterate my opinion here... I apologize in advance for being repetitive, but at the same time, I think everyone agrees this deserves its own thread.

    I agree, we are taxed too much... Joe Gartler says he would cut the tax, and that if ONLY sensible cuts were made, etc. I stated to Joe.. that wasn't an option. "Sensible cuts" were not an option when these decisions were made.... it was already too late. SO your options, revisiting the beginning of the year, are cut everything as it was listed, or the penny. You yourself just said that you would cut SPECIFIC things. That was not an option.

    SO my question is still the same. What is thesolution? Everyone right now is afforded hindsight... something the legislators voting at the beginning of the year didn't get. As far as pork and patronage cutting.... isn't the pork gone from the legislature? What are you going to cut? As far as waste... didn't Kennedy attack the cell phones and the cars, etc. right off the bat?

    I agree wholeheartedly that a tax increase is not reform... but my question is what do you do in the meantime while reform is in process? How do you keep functioning? At what cost is the penny saved? As a good teacher in highschool said many times "You can pay me now... or you can pay me later." We skipped the penny. We now have estimates of a deficit as high as 115mil+. How much revenue has the county lost to Niagara county on DMV's? What is it going to cost to repair things next year that went to pot this year because of neglect?

    Voting yes to the tax IS a bandaid... but our county is heavily wounded... the county needs reform desperately, and hopefully we will see it soon. But what do we do about today?

    And yes, there are struggling people all over the place that would suffer for the penny. But think about how much they will suffer if we ignore the fact that EC is NOT paying it's debts right now, that the county is in a massive deficit, that we are going to be paying late fees on bills... that we are paying out to workers that cashed in on their unemployment, etc... A bit of forsight is necessary... and the county needs to look beyond today and at next year, and 5 years, and 10 years...

    So how do you deal with that? How do you justify to the taxpayers that a golf course that was shut down to save 80K will cost 500K to repair next year? How to you tell me that DRIVING the revenue generating businesses of the county is helping us?

    Hey, I live in the county and I would cringe at the thought of paying an extra penny. I HATE the idea. But I am also the type of guy that doesn't think that carrying debt is a good idea nor feel that postponing bills, paying late fees, etc is acceptable. That's now how I work it, and that is not how I think the county should run either. A penny? God... that would really hit me hard in the pocket next year... and I would cringe each and every time I saw something I purchased ring up with a 9+% tax added on... but I cringe a lot harder at the thought of what it would cost me if we don't step up to the plate, start paying our county bills, fix this 100mil budget gap, and steady the sinking ship.

    The penny IS a bandaid... I will not argue with anyone on that point. But the other side of not bandaging a wound is ignoring it and hoping it will go away. This budget deficit is not going away any time soon. These bills the county is slacking on need to be paid. Do we need reform? Absolutely. Can we shave money from the budget right now? Sure. Is there still patronage to be cut? Indeed there is. But this takes time. We need a fix RIGHT Now.

    Just my humble opinion. DO I want a penny? No. Do I think the tax is necessary? Yes... at this point, unless some sort of absurd reform occurs immediately.

    On the same note, do I think the penny could be "temporary" as they propose it? I would have to assume that there is a way to write an expiration into the wording of the passage of lthe law... There are always ways to get around things, and as everyone says, once lawmakers tend to get a tax... they don't relinquish it very often...
    Anyway, that's my 1cents... I gave Erie County my other one.

  2. #2
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    I like your posts, Mr ReformWNY. You seem to be very astute. Good for you!

    SO my question is still the same. What is thesolution? Everyone right now is afforded hindsight... something the legislators voting at the beginning of the year didn't get. As far as pork and patronage cutting.... isn't the pork gone from the legislature? What are you going to cut? As far as waste... didn't Kennedy attack the cell phones and the cars, etc. right off the bat?
    This is a sticking point for me too. The media keeps drilling "pork and patronage" into our heads. Politics DOES NOT WORK without patronage. I had patronage jobs, people in my family have had partonage jobs, etc. We were completely qualified for the jobs we had, too. People do not do things for free anymore. If you help someone out, they do the same for you. Patronage does not cost the taxpayers anything beyond what they would have paid someone that was not given a position as a favor. How else do you repay your most loyal supporters?

    As for waste, Tim should be commended for taking away cell phones and cars. In the grand scheme of things, however, these items are a drop in the bucket of our budget mess. I'm positive that as Tim recognizes other money drains, they too will be addressed.

    agree wholeheartedly that a tax increase is not reform... but my question is what do you do in the meantime while reform is in process? How do you keep functioning? At what cost is the penny saved? As a good teacher in highschool said many times "You can pay me now... or you can pay me later." We skipped the penny. We now have estimates of a deficit as high as 115mil+. How much revenue has the county lost to Niagara county on DMV's? What is it going to cost to repair things next year that went to pot this year because of neglect?
    While I do not have an answer to this question, as I cannot specifically name things that could be cut, I do have a comment. Currently, a homeowning family earning $70000 a year in WNY gives 50% of his or her earnings to local, state, and federal governments. 33%-36% goes towards income taxes, 6% goes towards property tax, then there is the 8% (soon to be 9.25% sales tax), government usage fees (licenses, courts, permits), school tax, etc. If you are a pack-a-day smoker, the state gets $405.15 of your money per year. At some point, we have to say "No More!" What, exactly, is our government spending our hard-earned money on? How much more do we have to give before we can say we are no longer in debt?

    This isnt a matter of "we need more sales tax to fix things" - this is a matter of getting creative. Lets stop spending money on everything and reevaluate what we need. Our municipalities are our biggest employers. That just wont work. I'll bet you could lay off 33% of our current government employees and still run it efficiently. I understand that there are issues with contracts, politics, etc. Maybe insolvency isnt such a bad thing.

    A big flaw of the Laffer Curve is the fact that it does not take into consideration that people wont stop working as a result of higher taxation - they will just move, which seems to be the situation now.

    I would bet that the Sales Tax penny would be supported more if it had a REAL end point to it. A clause that stipulates that it cannot be renewed after an end date. How many times will the public be duped into supporting another "temporary tax", only to find out that years later, they are still paying it and it really didnt pay for anything anyways!

    I, personally, feel that we have too many governments. I support the idea of regionalism and feel that getting rid of layers upon layers of goverment mess can help the area. I wouldnt trust our current leadership to do it, though.

    Great thread, Reformer.

  3. #3
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    Kennedy and Wroblewski not voting for tax...

    Lets see what the scoop is on this. I just heard it on WBEN...

    Should be interesting. Anyone else hear that?

  4. #4
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    No...

    Kennedy just called out on Channel 2 that he will support the tax if Giambra steps down.

    I'm clapping... anyone else?

  5. #5
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    A one handed clap. That tax needs to have a limit for the well being of our residents.

    I'm impressed, though, that someone had the nads to say that. Shall we start calling him "Timerity"?

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