Keep in mind while your read/watch this. Have you EVER seen sales tax go down?
Senate Democrats: It’s time for a sales tax hike
By CURT WOODWARD Associated Press Writer
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) - State Senate Democrats want to temporarily raise the sales tax by three-tenths of a penny, hike the cigarette tax by $1 per pack and close a long list of tax exemptions to help balance the state budget.
The Senate’s budget proposal, revealed Tuesday morning, calls for about $920 million in additional tax revenue to help solve the state’s $2.8 billion budget deficit.
The tax plan is larger than one proposed last week by Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire but smaller than what many education and social service advocates have been pleading for since the legislative session began.
Read the rest of the Democrats “solution” at KOMONews.com.
Did Senator Margarita Prenticefrom Renton’s 11th District just violate your constitutional voting rights again? Prentice pushed to strip your initiative (I-960) that YOU(the majority of the voters in Renton) passed that requires a two thirds vote to raise YOUR taxes. Good OLD Margarita in collusion with Senator Brown (Senate Democratic Majority Whip) introduced a bill that would get rid of the initiatives requirement of a two third majority vote by the house and Senate to raise your taxes.
Do you think that Prentice is one of those professional dinosaur politicians whose time has come to be voted out of office? She does not represent you; the only thing she represents is the continued uncontrolled overspending of your tax dollars. She is a key link in the chain that created the problem of why Washington State is in the current budget shortfall by more than TWO BILLION DOLLARS..
If you have any second thoughts of maybe voting for her again, please take the time to meet her in person and question her as to why she feels that she know more than you do when it come to raising your State and Local tax burden. The Renton City Administration just loves her because they know that if they need more taxing authority, they can always depend on good OLD Prentice to ram a bill through in Olympia that will give them what they want. More tax dollars from YOU and YOURfamily.
When talking to a local Renton City Councilman about Renton’s excessive spending he said, “You shouldn’t be so concerned about the city of Renton’s spending habits, because government has lots of money“. This seems to be the same mind set the Prentice has. So if you keep voting people like Prentice into office, it is a given fact that your tax burdens both locally and State wide will continue to increase at an alarming rate. Think about how you will pay these ever increasing taxes when you are retired and on a fixed income.
The state Senate is expected to take its final vote on the temporary suspension of Initiative 960, just ahead of the House and Senate Democrats unveiling their budget proposals.The Associated Press
OLYMPIA, Wash. -
The state Senate is expected to take its final vote on the temporary suspension of Initiative 960, just ahead of the House and Senate Democrats unveiling their budget proposals.
I-960 makes it harder for legislators to raise taxes, which is why the Democratic majority needs it to be suspended. The Senate must agree to changes made by the House, which approved the suspension last week. The Senate vote is scheduled for Monday night.
This post is courtesy of the Washington Policy Center. If you want to know what the folks in Olympia are doing to you (not for you), we encourage you to visit the Washington Policy Center web site.
So with a tax increase like this, do you really think that more businesses are going to come to Renton? We have already joined the highest taxed cities in the state club. And don’t forget, we still need to pay for The Landing. It’s time to cut services. Many of us have had to cut back on our budget. It’s time the City, County and State do the same. If they don’t, vote them out.
If you want to see how Renton stacks up to other cities, it is available here: Local Sales and Use Tax.
OFM projects sales tax increase would last through 2015
The Office of Financial Management released today the required I-960 fiscal impact statement for the proposed sales tax increase in HB 3183.
HB 3183 would increase the state’s sales tax rate from 6.5% to 7.5%, a 15.4% increase. The rate would drop back to 6.5% once the state’s unemployment rate hit 5% for four consecutive months.
by Associated Press
Posted on February 19, 2010 at 2:12 PM
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LONGVIEW, Wash. - New federal rules for low-performing schools are pushing out the principal of a Longview middle school.
School officials say they were forced to remove Bill Marshal from Monticello Middle School. The 59-year-old will retire at the end of the school year — a year earlier than he planned — unless he takes another job with the district administration.
Legislature: Supporter not sure he has needed votes
JORDAN SCHRADER; Staff writer
Published: 02/19/1012:05 am | Updated: 02/19/1012:07 pm
Ballot-measure promoter Tim Eyman and allies are losing one fight this legislative session - to keep Initiative 960 on the books - but their prospects might be better on another front: defending the initiative process and their livelihoods.
Proposed regulations on the people who are paid to gather voter signatures are losing steam. Supporters, at least for now, don’t have the votes to push Senate Bill 6449 through the House State Government Committee.
The bill, approved by the Senate on Monday and considered Thursday by the House panel, would require paid signature gatherers and the businesses that employ them to register with the state every time they work on a campaign for an initiative or referendum.
This seems to be an ongoing source of confusion for a lot of homeowners here in Renton who are wondering “why are my property taxes still going up on our family home if the valuation has gone down?”
The problem comes from the fact that properties in King County were assessed in January 2009, just after home values began to plummet in the region. Complicating this problem were TWO specific SCHOOL levies that voters approved in Renton that added $300 million. That was just the upfront cost. Now add another 5 to 6 hundred million more for interest and you have the true cost of the levy.
Voodoo Tax economics is the word of the day from the Renton School District Administration. They pushed misinformation to inform the misinformed that the School Bonds would hardly raise their property taxes. These overpaid school bureaucrats now consume more than 33.5 percent of your yearly property taxes.
When it comes to SOARING PROPERTY taxes, count your lucky stars you don’t live in Renton.
Add to that the fact that test scores have yet to improve significantly and you’ve got a recipe for disaster. It’s no surprise that 2 of the 3 council members that have school age children choose private school or homeschooling over the Renton School District.
Just when most of us have gotten used to using the “Coal Creek/I-90″ lane on Northbound I-405, our “represenatives” in Olympia are considering clogging the freeway up again. Can’t they leave well enough alone?
Tolling Interstate 405 Needs a Closer Look
House Bill 2941 was proposed during the current Legislative Session. The bill would authorize the use of express toll lanes on Interstate 405 (I-405).1 The bill is vague and presumably relies on a study that does not adequately compare toll lanes to a no-build option. The legislature should request a full and complete comparison to a no-build option before authorizing the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) to build express toll lanes on I-405.
Senate Ways and Means passes bill that would ease way for tax increases
The Senate Ways and Means Committee on Monday afternoon approved Senate Bill 6843, which would suspend Tim Eyman’s Initiative 960 and let lawmakers increase taxes with a simple majority vote.
The measure now goes to the full Senate for consideration.
Salaries for City of Renton employees in 2008 were over $60,000,000. This included over $3.7 million in overtime alone.
Again, we ask the question. If the City of Renton needs to cut budgets to save things like the library, why not cut salaries by 5%. That works out to about $3,000,000 if we do our math correctly.
If you really want to cut the budget eliminate 5 people making over $100,000 and right there you save the City $500,000.
The private sector has had to make cuts. Why not the City too?
