The King County Sheriff’s Department, prosecutor’s office and other law enforcement officials have sounded the alarm over impending budget cuts, warning that they could result in a significant adverse impact on public safety. And no doubt that’s true.
But as municipal governments statewide struggle to cope with the economic downturn and its resulting decline in sales and property tax revenues, it is important to remember that the criminal justice system comprises over 70 percent of the general fund of nearly every county in the state, and thus any substantial decline in local tax revenues is going to inevitably impact public safety. You simply cannot effectively address substantial budget shortfalls without addressing the largest part of your budget.
Washington Democrats have every reason to be cheered over last Tuesday’s election results, but as far as I can tell our party leaders have no plan in place to address our long term state and local structural revenue deficit… a deficit that when adjusted for good and bad economic times, assures that tax revenues cannot possibly keep pace with economic growth, and thus cannot possibly keep pace with growth in demand for public services.
If what we want is a dramatically smaller government, we can elect Republicans, or, apparently, we can elect Democrats, and just gradually get to the same place by default. If that’s what voters really want, just don’t complain when the Sheriff’s Department starts laying off officers.
How long can a serious discussion of tax reform (yes, income tax) be postponed? Forever it would seem.
You talk to just about any run of the mill Democratic Party activist and they strongly support tax reform…our elected Democratic Party officeholders? Not so much.
Against this same background, Arnold Schwarzennegar has broken ranks with his party and called for a tax increase to help get California out of its present miasma of debt.
The classic conservative philosophy advocates mimimalist government, operating within its means. We certainly haven’t had that in the last eight years, and the domination of the Republican Party by apologists for corporate socialism (i. e. “Robin Hood in reverse”) suggest that either there aren’t too many true conservatives left, or that that’ve been cowed for years into subservience to a cadre of gansters masquerading as politicians.
It’s sure got to suck being Sue Rahr nowadays.
The elected officials can’t talk about it. It’s the “third rail” of Washington State politics – you touch it, you die. You saw how hard (what’s his name? Oh yea, Rossi) tried to burn Gregoire with that one at the end of the campaign. Even bringing up the subject once as being worthy of discussion immediatly finds it’s place in negative campaign ads.
So that leaves it up to us, the people of the State of Washington. We need to build a groundswell of support, which could be finalized as the elected officials “bowing to the will of the people” either in enacting legislation or through the initiative process. I suspect that considering the volatility of the subject, an initiative is the only thing that would work.
But that would need to be a very carefully drafted initiative, one which clearly is revenue neutral in total impact, and one which actually reduces taxes for most of Washington residents. It would need to eliminate the sales tax & B& O tax completely, in order to save administration expenses, remove from merchants the problems of enforcing multi-state compacts for sales tax collections, etc. Preferably, the initiative would already have the backing of many respected people in Washington State, including some elected officials who’s position is safe, but also some well-known names in business and industry who would be adversly affected individually, but who’s sense of public service outweighs any personal loss. Kind of like the coalition which formed King Co. Metro government and the environmental coalition which cleaned up Lake Washington in the 1970’s.
But the problem is that if you wait too long to file the intiative, then you run the danger of some anti-income tax person from filing a “poison pill” initiative early, specifically drafted to scare the daylights out of the average voter, and then the medial would trumpet the results of that vote as proof that “Washington doesn’t want an income tax – ever!”.
Yes, tax reform is badly needed but drug sentencing reform is needed as well.
Too many non-violent offenders are locked up in jail. They need to be released but they need jobs waiting for them when they get out.
Way easier said than done.
And then the whole ugly machinery that has grown around our foolish drug laws needs to be reformed. A sizable number of everyone from prosecutors to prison guards to cops may have to find something else to do.
What a mess!
Frankly, I could not agree more. The Democrats, both nationally and in Washington State are falling into the tax-and-spend trap again. We must be able to keep a fiscal house in order or Republicans will always be able to use it against us.
Is income _all_ a person’s income or just their salary? OR’s income tax form was a nightmare when I lived there; any income tax in WA should be very simple.
There still needs to be an effort by Democrats to begin to counter act the 30+ years of ‘taxes are bad’, with informed examples of the issues our state needs to face and how we will pay for them.
Ignoring those who say that flat taxes and sales taxes are ‘fair’ or buying into the meme that taxes are something you need ‘relief’ from; rather than the dues you pay for being a member of society, doesn’t make for decent policy.
so called criminals are locked up for the most minor of drug offense for years and years
now is the time to reform these overly harsh sentences, which, were never about the crime but about keeping the system full of paying cell mates
even in this state, there are thousands of busts for casual marijuana use, we can end those at once and save tons of money
progressive voices need to point that out in this so called fiscal crises – a time for forcing reform, no cash
use cop cars for ten years – how about that – drop overtime and some of the fringe benefits to employees as well
Kirk@71: To make a state income tax “popular” (as if ANY tax could be “popular”), you need to keep it simple.
The simplist state income tax piggy-backs onto the federal system. The tax form reads like this:
See- that’s not so hard. The hard part is keeping the various politicians from trying to make “small changes” in the tax forms in order to fund one project, or discourage another type of activity. You need strong leadership to insist that the tax reporting system be kept “clean” of such manipulations.
What a number of people fail to consider is the “Internal Services” portion of the budget. It’s a separate “fund” outside the General Fund portion of the budget. The GF is 13% of the budget, the IS is 9%. In absolute terms, for 2009 the IS budget is $430.5 M and the entire law and justice budget is $457 M
From the KC budget page:
“• Internal service: information technology, facilities, finance, employee benefits, and workers’ compensation.”
“By state law non-General Funds may not be
used to support General Fund activities.”
So the cost of KC government itself is outside the GF. It’s a nice dodge, to get your costs on a protected line item.
What it means is that the fat cats downtown won’t have to face the same cuts as the useful people like sheriff’s deputies and firemen.
I would have the IS budget rolled back in to the GF and have ALL KC departments feel the pain too, not just the departments that provide services to the citizens.
@6:
What is a ‘tax and spend trap’?
When did we, as Democrats, ‘fall’ into one?
What do you mean ‘put our fiscal house in order’?
rhp @9,
My recollection from Pennsylvania was that my state income tax form was the size of a postcard. Considering the great job the state did moving the B&O tax reporting process online, it could be as simple as entering your SS# and 1040 line x, and the state figures out the rest, either sending you or refund or a bill.
Goldy @ #12: Yep, it’s not hard, if you make “simple” a priority.
What IS hard is when federal tax policy changes, but the state doesn’t want to go along with those changes for it’s own purposes. So, for example, if the federal goverment decides that capital gains won’t get recognized as income for tax purposes, then the state might not want to follow suit. But fooling around with the definition of “income” is what causes the really complicated forms. You have to decide which is more important – public support behind an income tax, or your preferences regarding tax policy and revenue needs.
The politicians need to get out there and make the case for any new taxes instead of hiding behind “slowing tax revenues”. They need to do a better job of explaining where the money goes. They need to show some real reforms in the high cost areas like Criminal Justice. Until they do, the voters won’t believe there is a real need for an income tax.
In the spirit that we are about to see a bipartisan revision to the state Basic Education Plan in the 2009 state legislative session, from which we can then determine its real cost and how much of it we want to pay for, perhaps we need to have an equivalent Safe Neighborhoods Plan, worked out between the three largest counties in the Puget Sound, to best explain what their needs are.
You’re then stating up front what’s seen as necessary by the county governments, or at least by the sheriff’s departments of these three counties, starting the conversation on that issue, with the inevitable question being, “OK, what will it cost? If it’s too much, what will you do without?”
People can get further educated, as a result, about just what it costs to do the basics of local society – education and safety – and from there better relate it to its cost and the means to pay for it.
And if you want city level services…live in a city! Counties should not even be trying to compete with the service level of a city, unless those in the unincorpated areas are willing to foot the whole bill.
“And if you want societal level services…live in a society!”
There. Fixed that.
“Counties should not even be trying to compete with the service level of a city,”
They don’t.
“unless those in the unincorpated areas are willing to foot the whole bill.”
They can’t possibly do so, so I guess they’ll just have to go without, eh?
The ONLY way I’ll support an income tax is the sales tax is turned off. Completely. Any sales tax levies are grandfathered, but MUST expire in 30 years at the latest and after 20 years, they gradually tapir down to 0. It’s not allowed to extend them.
Proud- there are some specific revenue sources available to cities which are not available to counties- utility taxes in oarticular. Live in a city, you pay them. Live in an unincorporated area you do not.
particular, not “oaticular”