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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I suspect many of you already receive Jim's
Eye-Opener, but just in case. It always makes for interesting
reading.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Sue H. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message -----
<DIV style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A
title=jhansen@uvidaho.org href="mailto:jhansen@uvidaho.org">Jim Hansen</A>
</DIV>
<DIV><B>To:</B> <A title=action-for-idaho@lists.onenw.org
href="mailto:action-for-idaho@lists.onenw.org">UV Eye Opener</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Sent:</B> Saturday, March 01, 2008 10:29 AM</DIV>
<DIV><B>Subject:</B> [Uv-Eye-Opener] Saying "Oui!" to corporate tax
breaks</DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV align=center><IMG height=67 alt=[] src="cid:.0" width=106> <FONT
color=#800000 size=7><B>UV-Eye-Opener<BR></B></FONT><FONT size=2><I>Volume 11,
Number 6 - February 18-29, 2008<BR>United Vision for Idaho & United Action
for Idaho<BR></FONT><FONT color=#800000 size=2>An update of Idaho’s legislature
from a progressive perspective. Pass it on...<BR><BR></I></FONT></DIV><FONT
size=4><B>Infatuation with tax giveaways strikes again. </B>On Thursday, if you
walked by the House Revenue & Taxation Committee you would have seen a pack
of legislators fawning over their latest corporate friend: a French corporation
called Areva, Inc. A majority of lawmakers on the committee said a giddy “Oui!
Oui!” to two bills that give away a big chunk of Idaho’s tax base to entice the
company to build a facility in Idaho. The site consultants for the company – who
no doubt receive generous compensation in return for all the tax breaks they get
for their client – would not guarantee that Areva will actually set up shop in
Idaho. After the vote, they probably flew to Paris to compare similar goodies
offered by other states to see which one was the biggest sucker. Study after
study show that quality education, and educated work force and transportation
and communication infrastructure are what companies look for when they want to
locate a new facility. Not more tax breaks. Check out an analysis by <A
href="http://www.goodjobsfirst.org/corporate_subsidy/locations_consultants.cfm">Good
Jobs First</A> on “How Site Location Consultants Manipulate Corporate Investment
Decisions.”<BR> <BR><B>How do you say “shift” in French?</B> Since Idaho
must balance the budget, these tax break bills simply shift the tax burden to
other taxpayers who don’t have slick consultants lobbying for them. The fact
that the legislature has already revised its revenue projections down for this
year is evidence that past tax give-aways do have consequences. <A
href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/H0561.html">House Bill 561</A> would extend
the sales tax production exemption to Areva’s line of work. The production
exemption is based on the theory that some companies should not have to pay
sales tax on things they acquire to produce a product since that product will be
subject to sales tax when it is sold. It did not seem to bother the majority on
the committee that this French company’s “product” (enriched uranium) is not
likely to be sold, let alone taxed, in Idaho. <A
href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/H0562.html">House Bill</A><A
href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/H0562.html"> 562</A> goes even further,
giving Areva a cap on its property taxes if it reaches the investment level its
consultants promise. In fact, the property tax give-away is twice as generous as
the cap legislators gave to Micron a few years back.<BR><BR><B>The sales tax on
food “part deux.”</B> Perhaps feeling guilty at giving away such generous gifts
to a foreign company, the tax committee printed a bill on Friday that would help
offset some of the impact of the sales tax on food. There was a big difference
how the committee approached each issue, however. With Areva’s bills, Chairman
Dennis Lake scheduled several proposals so they could be evaluated together.
With the tax on food, the chairman is scheduling them one at a time, refusing to
let alternatives such as removing the food tax entirely from coming before the
committee. The new bill, <A
href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/H0588.html">House Bill 588</A>, acknowledges
that low income families spend more of their household income on food than
wealthier families, but it offers only a small increase in the credit (far less
than the actual impact of the sales tax on food). It provides a refund for
Idaho’s poorest taxpayers to apply to receive $50 if they don’t make enough to
pay income taxes but, sadly, it also prohibits low income families that are
forced to rely on food stamps from getting the credit. To keep too many people
from hearing about the bill, the committee scheduled the public hearing for
first thing Monday morning.<BR><BR><B>“Au revoir” to the promise of paying
teachers for going the extra mile.</B> After many long days of testimony on
competing approaches on how to evaluate and compensate classroom teachers for
improving their skills and taking on additional responsibilities, senators were
presented with a so-called “compromise” bill this week. It squeaked out of
committee and was killed by the full Senate on Friday. The bill’s biggest
weakness was that it did not involve teachers in coming up with a workable
system and continued to rely on standardized test scores to determine a
teacher’s ability. <A href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/S1436.html">Senate
Bill 1436</A> stripped some of the most offensive provisions of Superintendent
Tom Luna’s original bill (namely the punishment of linking a temporary salary
boost to abandoning their contract rights). Even though the sponsor of SB 1436
Sen. John Goedde presented it as a “compromise,” his use of the term was
disingenuous. Enough of Goedde’s colleagues saw through it and sent him back to
the drawing board. <BR><BR><B>Turning their backs on humanity</B>. Last week,
the Senate State Affairs Committee put Idaho in a diminishing group of public
entities that have turned their backs on murder and terrorism in the Darfur
region of Sudan. John Sullivan deserves huge thanks and respect for his work to
bring thousands of people in Idaho together to support this bill. Rep. Nicole
LeFavour, one of the bill’s co-sponsors, wrote a reflection on the cynicism of
the Committee’s vote in <A
href="http://notesfromthefloor.typepad.com/notes_from_the_floor/2008/02/triumph-of-cyni.html">her
</A>blog<A
href="http://notesfromthefloor.typepad.com/notes_from_the_floor/2008/02/triumph-of-cyni.html">
of February 21</A>. The staff of the Public Employee Retirement System of Idaho
(PERSI) spent public money to lobby against the bill, even though the state was
protected by a federal law that encouraged states to divest from companies
funding genocide in Sudan. PERSI made sure the Republicans on the committee fell
in line by having one of its board members who has also been the Idaho
Republican Party Chairman sit in front to keep an eye on the Senators as they
cast their votes. Senators Joe Stegner, Bart Davis, Clint Stennett and Kate
Kelly voted yes. (2Rs & 2Ds). Senators Brad Little, Bob Geddes, Mike
Jorgenson & Denton Darrington voted no (4Rs). It was up to Chairman Curt
McKenzie of Nampa – one of the early supporters of the bill – to break the tie.
Students from Northwest Nazarene University in his home town had testified about
a resolution they passed in support of <A
href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/S1367.html">Se</A>nate Bill<A
href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/S1367.html"> 1367</A>. McKenzie, however,
buckled under the political pressure and voted no.<BR><BR><B>Watch out who’s in
the passing lane?</B> This time of year, bills get introduced and start weaving
through the process like a NASCAR driver in rush hour traffic. It is not pretty.
On Wednesday, the governor’s office went to the Senate to present his bills to
increase vehicle registration fees to pay for roads and to help cover some of
the cost of the state police. But, the next day, the House Ways & Means
Committee (a special leadership committee that only meets when the Speaker of
the House wants it to) quickly gathered to introduce three new bills. It
convened again on Friday to introduce two more. Among these are two variations
on the governor’s fee increase; a bill that will place limits on how money is
spend on road projects with the GARVEE bonds (remember the debt-financed
projects that former Governor Kempthorne pushed through in 2006); and a bill
that scrutinizes how the Transportation Department does business with
consultants and contractors. The way the bills suddenly popped up seems to have
triggered a little road rage on the part of some legislators and the governor’s
office. Of course, being ignored in all this traffic is any plan to empower
local communities to actually address congestion with a variety of transit
options.<BR><BR><B>What does open government smell like? </B>Some people think
thousands of cows or pigs confined in a single operation will smell like (how do
I say this delicately) like manure. I suppose some people may think they will
smell like “fine Corinthian leather.” If you live over a mile away from the
operation, it does not matter what you think you’ll smell. Idaho law prohibits
you from testifying at public hearings on siting the operation. All the new wind
turbines cropping up in Idaho attest to the fact that this is one windy state.
The one-mile limitation is absurd and the Senate repealed it last year. But
something stinky happened in the House. Rep. Lenore Barrett, chair of the Local
Government Committee, was permitted to kill the bill by never scheduling a
hearing. This week, the same bill – <A
href="http://www3.state.id.us/oasis/S1402.html">Senate Bill 1402</A> – passed by
a 30-4 margin. (Senators Steve Bair, Monty Pearce, Mel Richardson and Jeff
Siddoway were the four who must have lost their sense of smell). So, the
question remains: will Barrett and the Speaker of the House keep the SB 1402
bottled up or will they expose it to the fresh air of open government? Stay
tuned. Or, should I say, keep your nose to the wind.<BR><BR></FONT>
<DIV align=center><FONT color=#800000>UV-Eye-Opener is a joint publication of
United Vision for Idaho & United Action for Idaho<BR>More information on
issues pending on the state and federal level<BR>can be found at our websites <A
href="http://www.uvidaho.org/" eudora="autourl">www.uvidaho.org<BR></A>and <A
href="http://www.unitedactionforidaho.org/"
eudora="autourl">www.unitedactionforidaho.org<BR></A>Call us at (208)
331-7028<BR><BR></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>