Technical problems are following me. I\u2019ve not been able been able to read clips statewide for most of the past couple of days, but from what I have been able to read and have heard from some suggests we might be coming into crunch time. Who will blink and how hard?<\/p>\n
With GOP conservatives trying hard to take the heat off themselves, some have said they\u2019d support raising the sales tax \u00bd-cent. But that is far from halfway towards the Senate plan. And after a couple weeks of unrelenting pressure from citizens, professional groups and the press to pass a sustainable budget, I don\u2019t see why Senate GOPers and Dems need to settle for that.<\/p>\n
The \u00bd-cent increase is only a band-aid. We\u2019ll be back next year trying to figure out how to raise revenues again. Without my files with me in too-warm-for-great-skiing Colorado, I\u2019m relying on memory: A half-cent sales tax brings in about $700 million. The Senate had already compromised by cutting about $1.6 billion in new transportation revenues and now have a budget with a tax increase of $2.2 billion. <\/p>\n
If conservatives stick to the \u00bd-cent increase as the only statewide tax they\u2019d endorse, maybe a compromise is to give counties the same taxing authority as cities and towns have and let them have either a \u00bd-cent sales-tax or income tax surcharge authority. The key would be to allow the localities to keep ALL the tax revenue raised by the optional tax.<\/p>\n
Such a compromise allows conservative delegates a chance to pass the buck while they claim credit for passing a budget. And passing the buck seems to be the best the GOP can offer is terms of governance.<\/p>\n
But that compromise may run into the fear some have of increasing disparity in local services, especially in schools where a court challenge could prove problematic. Folks in less prosperous areas where a local add-on tax isn\u2019t affordable or brings in too little won\u2019t like being left farther behind. But localities willing to raise their own taxes won\u2019t want to see too much distributed elsewhere. <\/p>\n
So it seems there are a lot of folks who still need to keep screaming. The \u00bd-cent is too little too late.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m screaming as loud as I can from the mountains. I hope to hear more than my own echo.<\/p>\n
And I hope with my return, the techno gremlins are gone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Technical problems are following me. I\u2019ve not been able been able to read clips statewide for most of the past couple of days, but from what I have been able to read and have heard from some suggests we might be coming into crunch time. Who will blink and how hard? With GOP conservatives trying… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}