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I'M SO DISILLUSIONED

May 12, 2008

Al Sharpton, a tax cheat? I thought he was a man of the people. More here. How could I be more disillusioned?

Well, maybe if I found out that the statewide 1-cent sales tax increase enacted last month by the Iowa legislature wasn't really passed just to help the children:

City officials could redirect money collected from local-option sales taxes without the public's vote under a last-minute amendment added to a state budget bill in the final hours of this year's legislative session.

It means that special 1-cent sales taxes that voters have approved in hundreds of Iowa cities for such things as road and sewer improvements could instead be used to give tax breaks to developers or in numerous other ways.

The new sales tax replaces county-by-county local option sales taxes. The county taxes had to be renewed every ten years by referendum, and the politicians just hated that. They argued for the new statewide tax on the grounds that the money was needed for education. Some naifs believed them. Or said they did.

"This bill allows cities to use a bait-and-switch on their citizens," Michael King, president of the Iowa State Association of Counties, wrote in a May 2 letter to Gov. Chet Culver.

Under the revision, public officials could change the use of the tax collection as long as it's used to help pay for an urban renewal project. Such renewal areas are generally locations that city and state officials have designated as slums or blighted, making them eligible for property tax breaks known as tax increment financing.

Yet the next time a sales tax or bond referendum goes down in flames, the elected officials will be just astounded that they aren't trusted.

State 29 has more.

Tags: corporate welfare.iowa tax policy.

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