Measure 66 & 67, a measure for Oregon

By Sage Kittelman · The Mainstream
Published January 26, 2010

While Oregon State Representatives Tim Freeman, Bruce Hanna and Senator Jeff Kruse made arguments to convince voters to oppose Measures 66 and 67, Senator Floyd Prozanski did his best to get them to vote in favor of the Measures.

The Ballots for the special election were mailed Jan. 8 and are due tonight.

The tax increases were passed in 2009 by the Oregon Legislature and signed into law by Governor Ted Kulongoski July 20, 2009. Concerned citizens and business holders almost immediately began circulating petitions to repeal the taxes, which began accruing retroactively in January of 2009. For the tax increases to be stopped the measures must not pass.

Contrary to the impression given by many advertisements by the Vote Yes Committees, no automatic cuts to any program, including education, will happen due to the measures failing. The result will only stop the taxes. The legislature will then meet in special session and decide where to make the cuts. They have the exclusive responsibility for balancing the budget and can choose to keep funding for important programs, like education and human services, whole.

Oregonians Against Job-Killing Taxes, a political organization formed to defeat Measures 66 & 67, collected substantially more than the 55,000 signatures needed to put the measures on the ballot, thereby putting the power of the vote in the hands of the people.

Each tax is retroactive to 2009, meaning that if these measures are successful tax payers in Oregon must pay all the taxes that have accrued since Jan. 1, 2009.

If passed, Representative Hanna predicts that state government will receive more than $733 million in new tax revenue from 2009 alone. The new revenue will go into Oregon’s General Fund.

Not everyone will be affected by the measures, only those with an income over $250,000 per household or $125,000 per individual. The first $2,400 of unemployment benefits would not be taxed and some corporations would pay an increase in the corporate minimum tax from $10 to $150, a tax that has not increased since 1931.

Supporters in the state legislature say the increases are needed to raise revenue to fund critical Oregon programs including education, healthcare and public safety. The supporters say that if the measures fail, those departments will suffer a loss of 5 to 10 percent of their funding.

However, Oregonians Against Job-Killing Taxes wants to avoid getting revenue by increasing the tax-load, especially when the recent economy claimed over 130,000 jobs in the past year.

“We don’t have a revenue problem, we have a jobs problem,” stated Hanna at a town hall meeting held at the Douglas County library on Jan. 4. He claimed that if the measures are successful another 70,000 Oregon jobs will be lost.

“We passed $1.9 billion in new taxes and fees during the last session,” stated Hanna. The new fees alone make up $392 million of that figure, according to Hanna; Oregon is in the lead for the highest income tax rates in the United States.

State Representative Tim Freeman assured the audience, which included small business owners and farmers; “they’re [the state] always going to spend more then what we send them.” He expressed that Oregon needed to send government a message to live within their means and stop surviving off of the backs of the tax payers.

Later that night, Jeff Kruse reported that in the last 10 years alone, the population of Oregon has increased by 10 percent, while the government of Oregon has increased by 60 percent.

Several organizations have openly expressed their support for the measures, including ;the League of Women Voters. Also in support is Senator Floyd Prozanski, who stated at the Sutherlin Community Center event that more than 82 percent of Douglas County would not be affected by the tax increase due to their low income levels.

Kevin Calkins, a teacher at May Street Elementary in Hood River, stated in a recent Oregonian article, that he supports the measures and was quoted saying, “Currently we employ about 12 people, down from about 50 just three years ago.”

Senator Jeff Kruse responded that the other 18 percent of the Douglas County population that would be affected is employing the 82 percent not directly affected. Kruse also stated that if the measures pass, businesses within the state “will either raise their prices or reduce spending elsewhere and their biggest cost is labor.”

The people who support the tax increases claim that three of the most important reasons to support the measures are their support of education, preserving class sizes and healthcare. They fear, that if the measures do not succeed, schools and colleges will see a significant drop in funding for teachers, and enrollment in the classes will drop due to students not having the funding they need. Supporters of health care, a popular issue, fear a sharp decrease in revenue if the measures fail.

“This [tax measure] is simple and it’s fair,” stated Representative Sara Gelser at a Gazette-Times sponsored event at the Corvallis Public Library held on Jan. 5.

In an opinion piece for The Register-Guard, Sean Vangordon addressed the issue of state budget, which filters into the education fund, his view was, that the “tax measures will kill jobs. More importantly these measures don’t protect the essential services in the long term.” Vangordon then stated that the budget for the years 2009 to 2011 was $53 billion, 9 percent more than the previous year’s budget.

“If the tax measures actually were a response to the economic situation, they would be temporary,” Vangordon said; “They do have temporary components, but they never expire. We will always be paying these taxes, even after the economy recovers.”

Over $8 million is estimated to have been spent on the political battle of Measure 66 & 67. Ballots can be dropped in one of the receptacles located around Douglas County or hand delivered to the Clerks Office in the Douglas County Courthouse. All ballots must be received by tonight.