We are in the last few days of the General Assembly for this year, I want to keep you posted on what is taking place. The conference committee met this morning and a vote has been called for on the current income tax proposal. This is the modified Flatter Income Tax plan with rates of 4% and 5% on earned income. The Senate is set to caucus at 10:30 and the conference committee will reconvene following this meeting. If you want to make your views–pro or con– known on this issue, now is the time.
I would also like to remind you that some of us in the Senate have
offered
numerous options for reducing the budget. Working with Senator Norris
and a
group of conservative senators, we offered over $350 million in
reductions
from the PROPOSED BUDGET. I filed a budget amendment to call for a 5%
reduction from each department’s allotment of state funds. This would
have
yielded a reduction of $440 million in the PROPOSED BUDGET. These
options
have not been accepted. I do think it is important for you to know
that we
have offered many options for reducing spending that do not call for
making
CUTS but do call for REDUCING THE GROWTH. This just shows how pro-tax
forces are not interested in working out a budget that will work for
the
majority of the people of the state. They are interested in having a
budget
that is built on an income tax.
CONTINUATION BUDGET- Some of us have had a proposed continuation
budget
filed for several months. We do think that a continuation budget is
the
best route to go, that a budget should be built on our current revenue
plus
our projected econpomic growth. We know that by doing this we could
have a
budget with NO TAX INCREASE OF ANY KIND. Yes, Tennessee has had
expansive
budget growth over the past decade and we do think that now is the time
to
restrain some of that growth and spending.
Please know that I will continue to fight AGAINST the tax and FOR
spending
and governmental reform. We must reduce our growth, reduce our
spending,
insist the departments prioritize their needs and reform our system.
We
need to return to zero-based budgeting that IS THE LAW in Tennessee.
We
need to roll back the size of government and address the growing
problems
with the Tenncare system. Adding more money to the system is not going
to
help address these problems. Reducing the money and looking at the
root
problems will help us move this process forward.
Marsha
