It isn’t often that I read the letters to the editor in the Orange County Register, much less get irritated enough to comment on them. However, today is a two-for.
The first letter, written by Mary Kidwell of La Habra
“I feel I paid my fair share for all that we received. What did you pay? If you are middle class, I highly doubt that you paid more than 7 percent.”
Well Mary, I am in that middle class you mention and I give well over 20% of my income to the State and Uncle Sam. If you include excise taxes and those “fees” at the DMV and gas pump, I give more than 50% of my hard-earned money to the government. Based on what you and I are paying in taxes, it looks like one of two things has happened:
A) You are paying too little for the services you enjoy, or B) I am paying too much for the services you enjoy. Either way you slice it, I’m paying the difference so that you can enjoy those government services.
Mary also contends that “It’s also just a little ridiculous that most seen at Tea Party rallies are obviously Social Security and Medicare recipients.” I’ll be 38 in a few days and I am OBVIOUSLY NOT receiving Social Security or Medicare. So far, Mary’s stereotype of Tea Party supporters (anti-tax abuse advocates) doesn’t seem to pan out.
I encourage anyone who would like to pay more in taxes to go ahead and send a donation to your government agency of choice. Give them as much as you like, I’m sure they won’t mind.
For the rest of us who feel we pay too much and actually do, be sure to elect leaders who won’t give away the company store.
One other letter to the editor got me fired up. The owner of Renick Cadillac and Subaru, Leonard M. Renick, seems to think it is OK to spend taxpayer’s money on corporate welfare. I suppose if I was in the business of trying to sell Cadillac’s and Subaru’s in Fullerton
Renick says, “It is not enough that [Norby's] influence as an elected official of Fullerton has left the city in a permanent state of dowdiness while Brea
He must be thinking of Mayor Pro Tem Don Bankhead. During Bankhead’s 22 years on the dais Fullerton Fullerton
Also worth pointing out is that Brea Brea has a very small population base and you see how Brea
But the best quote is saved for last. “Now, Norby throws in with Gov. Jerry Brown to strip cities of their ability to decide locally what would improve the local scene/economy and send the money to Sacramento so that Jerry Brown can buy more teacher and police union votes. Redevelopment is not perfect but local control beats the alternative.”
Mr. Renick didn’t get the memo that RDAs can not spend it wherever they want on whatever they want. The funds are legally encumbered by welfare projects and not the corporate type of welfare either. The worse part is that the RDA can borrow against the future tax revenues without voter approval. The Fullerton Redevelopment agency borrowed $29-million to meet their low-income housing funding requirements because they had already spent too much on other non-housing projects.
It doesn’t take a highly educated person to recognize that using tax revenue to prop up car dealers or any other business is just wrong.
Government exists to provide for the people that which the people cannot provide for themselves. It does not exist to bail out businesses or operate slush funds for the politically well connected.
Brown says he wants to eliminate redevelopment agencies, which raise money by diverting all increases in property tax revenue away from other agencies that normally would share them, and redistribute the funds to local governments’ general funds. The proposal is part of a strategy Brown has outlined to pare the state deficit by cutting state funding of local services.
ReplyDeleteThe above was from the Press democrat in Santa Rosa Ca.
This is just the beginning of cuts and new or more taxes. In his speech tonight, Governor Brown didn't propose a single program or bill that would cost the state money. When is the last time you heard a state of the state like that?
"Brown says he wants to eliminate redevelopment agencies, which raise money by diverting all increases in property tax revenue away from other agencies that normally would share them, and redistribute the funds to local governments’ general funds. The proposal is part of a strategy Brown has outlined to pare the state deficit by cutting state funding of local services."
ReplyDeleteTom, for years a lot of people have been crying fowl on the RDA. The idea of killing it for obvious reasons is not new. It is amazing and ironic that it takes a Democratic Governor to do the work the work of the Republican Party.
If brown tackles pensions and taxes with the same independence, I just might have to vote for him in 4-years. This state needs help and raising taxes to pay for the bad decisions and wasteful programs of the last 50 years is not the answer.