Our twist on property tax, income tax hearing today

By Taxpayers Association of Oregon
OregonWatchdog.com

Today in the House Revenue Committee is a hearing on HB 2079 and Hb 2087 which instruct the State Government to “study” property taxes and income taxes.

Sometimes these “study” bills are a way to spend taxpayer dollars promoting a tax.   For instance, the Legislature once spent over $100,000 tax dollars studying a carbon tax and later arrived at a bill that was the worst carbon tax idea in America.  A walkout led by the brave Republican leaders Sen. Herman Beartschiger and Rep. Christine Drazan helped killed that tax.

Sometimes these study bills are a placeholder to gut-and-stuff the bill with an actual tax at the very end of Legislative Session (this May/June) when people are not looking.  If this is the secret hidden intent, then these bills are part of a last minuet tax-hike scheme to defraud the public.

The Taxpayers Association of Oregon recommends that the State Government not waste time studying property taxes and income taxes but rather study where our property taxes and income taxes are being spent.

Taxpayers want to know where our property tax are going:

• Why are our property tax dollars being lost by the hundreds of millions to urban renewal projects which diverts funds meant for schools and critical local government services and uses it for projects that benefit private businesses?
• Why are tens of millions of property tax dollars being spent buying vacant land (for unused public purposes) which only makes the affordable housing crisis worse while taking property off the tax rolls (causing tax revenue to decline).
• Why are property taxes being spent on building $134 million dollar bridges that do not allow cars?

Taxpayers want to know where our income tax dollars are going:

• How much of our income tax dollars are lost to paying off the $28 billion government pension debt (PERS)?
• How much of our income tax dollars are being spent on hand-outs to private companies like spending tens of millions for Hollywood film companies and building mega-restaurants?
• How much of our income tax dollars were wasted with the $1 billion dollar ODOT fiasco, the $200 million CRC bridge that was never built, or the $200 million health care website that never enrolled a single person?
• How much of our income tax dollars were wasted on preventable computer crashes by Employment Dept., Housing Department, Health Department and DMV?

We ask our lawmakers at the hearing today to amend HB 2079 and HB 2087 to instead study how our property tax and income tax dollars are wasted.

Details on the bills below:

HB 2079 summary, “Requires the Legislative Revenue Officer to study the property tax system in this state.” HB 2079 is sponsored by Representative Nancy Nathanson.

HB 2087 summary, “Requires the Legislative Revenue Officer to study the property tax system in this state. ” HB 2087 is sponsored by Representative Nancy Nathanson

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