Dedicated to those who wish to limit or suspend the film credit. You couldn't make this up!!

TALLAHASSEE — Movies and TV shows with gay characters could be ineligible for a "family-friendly" tax credit in Florida under a little-noticed provision tucked into a $75 million incentive package that Republican House leaders hope will attract film and entertainment jobs to the state.

The bill would prohibit productions with "nontraditional family values" from receiving a so-called family-friendly tax credit. But it doesn't define what "nontraditional family values" are, something the bill's sponsor had a hard time doing, too.

"Think of it as like Mayberry," state Rep. Stephen Precourt, R-Orlando, said, referring to The Andy Griffith Show. "That's when I grew up — the '60s. That's what life was like. I want Florida to be known for movies for kids and all that stuff. Like it used to be, you know?”

This week parents with toddlers protested planned cuts in services, fee hikes at the State House. Last week the Environmental League of Massachusetts released a report that highlights the deep environmental spending cuts that have taken place in Massachusetts. While in the Environmental League of Massachusetts report environmental officials said that they understand that the current state fiscal crisis has forced spending cuts, both advocacy organizations evaded the tough question that legislators are facing today: cut these programs further, take money away from other programs to fund them or raise new revenues.  

“A healthy environment is the result of decisions we make together through our government through different policies, initiatives and decisions that keep our water clean and protect our green spaces.”

“Young children thrive when we support policies that create a network of support to help their families overcome their childrens’ health challenges.”

While everyone would agree with the above statements and would support funding these government initiatives, we cannot lose sight of the fact that there are many other worthy programs in our state that also contribute to the overall health of our community. In fact the State House corridors are packed everyday with hundred of single issue advocates lobbying for their worthy programs to be protected from cuts.

The public debate about these programs should not based on whether a program is more important than another one or which one is getting cut the most but on how we all as a community decide how to support all these structures by providing them with the necessary funding to keep them functioning and servicing our communities.

In good economic times we have cut taxes in the state to bring money back into “people’s pockets”. In bad economic times, we cut taxes to “re-active the economy and create jobs”. We can not have it both ways and expect to have the same level of services and programs.

We need to continue our one issue advocacy but add a revenue message to protect the entire range of important programs that we value in our communities.

Or is it?

Larry Bartels of Princeton shows that more often than not average Americans side with businesses and the wealthy in tax debates--voting for tax cuts they will never receive and against tax increases they will not pay:

“What is most remarkable is that this massive upward transfer of wealth has been broadly supported by ordinary Americans, despite a good deal of public suspicion that the benefits would go mostly to the rich. For example, a CBS News Poll in April 2001, shortly before the first big tax cut was passed, found that 51% of the public favored President Bush’s tax cut plan, while 55% said that “rich people” would “benefit most” from it.

“A Harris Poll in June 2003 found that 50% thought the 2003 tax cut was “a good thing,” while 42% said it would help “the rich” a lot and only 11% said it would help “the middle class” a lot. An even more recent survey in which respondents were reminded that “President Bush and Congress have made two major cuts in federal income tax rates” found that 54% of the public approved of those cuts, while only 37% disapproved.”

For many in Massachusetts and across the nation, Scott Brown’s January 19th victory is being widely hailed as a victory for anti-government, anti-tax crusaders. Brown won big in suburbia and Dedham was no exception (55 percent).

But on the same ballot, Dedham voters also voted by a higher margin (60 percent) to increase their property taxes. The reason voters chose to override the Proposition 2 ½ levy limit? Dedham chose to invest in their schools.

As we look at the status of the Massachusetts budget, it is easy to forget that we are not alone in making some very important decisions about our state and our communities.

Not only can we learn from the consequences of our own state's historic budget and revenue decisions, we can learn from other states working through the same issues!

Sunday's Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune Op-Ed, "The case for paying higher taxes, happily," laid out a scenario that was all too familiar - a state facing a structural deficit, another round of budget cuts, and advocates calling for even more tax cuts for big businesses. The authors, though push back, calling for a more balanced look at the effect of tax cuts:

What's good for General Mills usually is good for Minnesota. And despite the state's gigantic revenue shortage, some proposals at the Capitol to give further tax cuts and credits to businesses deserve a serious look.

But the assumption that more tax cuts are the only way to strengthen the state's economy is just plain wrong. It misses the truth on the flip side: What's good for the public also is vital for business in the long run.

The letter lays out a list of the ways those tax dollars would get spent that benefit large and small businesses as they do individuals throughout the state:

• ...Courts and the rule of law are essential not just for public safety but also for conflict resolution and contract enforcement for businesses.
• Delays and deteriorating roads -- due to the state's fast-growing congestion and crumbling transportation infrastructure -- build higher costs into the prices of products produced or sold here.
• Our public schools are being forced, in effect, to loan money to state government. Students at Minnesota's two-year colleges pay the third-highest tuition and fees of all 50 states. And Minnesota faces a growing achievement gap between white and nonwhite, and between affluent and poor households. These trends represent an erosion of Minnesota's educational advantage, the bedrock of our economic success.
  

As we move into the season where state legislators will decide on what gets funded in the state budget and what gets cut, we wanted to share various organizing materials for your use.

The most important single thing you can do during the next 5 months when the budget decisions are made is to organize a local meeting with your state representatives and state senators. Here you can tell them why these programs are important to you, why their funding must not be cut and cuts made should be restored, and the tax and revenue options that could enable this.

Each of your legislators will be meeting 1:1 with the powerful House and Senate Ways and Means Chairman during the next two months to tell them what their budget priorities are.

So when you meet with your legislators, you have a specific "ask" or proposal for them, namely, will they make funding the specific programs and at what funding level you care about be one of the budget priorities they make in their meetings with the Ways and Means Chairman.

You decide, based on your priorities which specific programs you want to bring up at these meetings. For example, as a youth violence prevention and teen jobs advocate, I will be bringing up programs like Shannon, DPH Youth Violence Prevention Program, Teen Jobs--YouthWorks and School to Career, ASOST, and/or Mentoring.

Remember that potential allies may be wary of promising support for our priorities while our state operates under a $3 billion deficit. They are forced to build budget priorities in an environment in which many worthy programs are competing against each other to be spared.

If we come to the table with suggestions on how to face our ongoing budget issues, options like reforming our current tax breaks, utilizing our Rainy Day Fund, and raising new, progressive taxes, then our credibility in asking for programmatic funding, or rolled back budget cuts is vastly improved. 

We wanted to share these documents for your use from a statewide training we did at the beginning of February:

1. Understanding the State Budget: how we got a deficit, what combination of cuts, savings, taxes was made last year, and what could happen this year.
2. Organizing meetings with legislators: A guide to setting meetings with your legislators, talking to them about your budget priorities, and what you can say on revenue if they say, "there's no money".
   

The wellbeing of communities across the Commonwealth relies on our capacity to work together through our government to continue building and supporting our public structures that provide quality education, public health, stable legal systems, safe recreation, clean water, and much more. We work through our government to protect these services when we elect our representatives, become civically engaged in our communities, and pay our taxes.

In a Globe article dated February 14th, Jennifer Fenn Lefferts reported how Concord is considering creative ways to reform its revenues to make its tax system more equitable. With an average property tax bill of $10,128, Concord has had trouble retaining lower-income and elderly residents and working farms.

The proposal calls for lowering the property tax and imposing a 2 percent tax on income. This means that each person would contribute a more equitable share of his or her income to the local community, making the overall local tax system more progressive.

Some other cities and states in the country, including New York City, allow the implementation of local income taxes. The Massachusetts Legislature would have to amend the state constitution to allow cities and towns in the state to implement and collect this new source of revenue.

It is interesting to note that Concord is considering a progressive local tax proposal at a time when some elected officials say there is no interest for more taxes. In addition to statewide revenue reforms, like the five previous ballot attempts to build a more progressive tax structure, maybe it is time to help communities like Concord create a tax system that sufficiently funds the needs, programs, and structures we all value and rely on in our own communities. Through these local initiatives we can demonstrate to our elected officials that our state as a whole needs real solutions to address our budget gap and the lack of resources needed to maintain and rebuild our public structures.

Through our elected officials - at all levels of government - we shape our economy. This happens through the decisions we make today, policies we implement for tomorrow, and the outside factors that continuously change around us.

Our public structures, such as the legal framework that regulates our property rights and courts, and the structures that educate our workforce and keep it healthy, have only developed through careful, long-term planning and effort. We invest in these structures through our government to promote healthy communities that attract businesses and build vibrant communities.

That is why we must make sure that Governor Patrick, Senate President Murray and House Speaker DeLeo understand that we are all interconnected and that they need to work together. Striving together, they can achieve policy decisions that positively influence the economic well-being of every community in our state. They could more easily foster economic development, building and implementing joint policies like the Governor's recently announced incentives for small businesses, and Senate President Murray proposal to create one-stop shops where all information about state programs and services would be available.

Together, we can influence how public policy works for the well-being of all.

It’s a tough time to talk about taxes in Massachusetts.  The House Speaker has asserted his opposition to any tax increases to deal with the state budget shortfall and echoes of the anti-tax rhetoric of the recent Senate campaign still ring in the public mind.

And tax conversations are never easy.  As Charles Pierce lays out in his excellent piece in the Globe Magazine this weekend, Americans have a love-hate relationship with taxes:

“Quite simply, if you love a particular government service -- that your bridges are repaired, for example, or your emergency calls answered -- you ought to love the taxes that pay for it. That, however, is rarely the case.”

And our conflicted relationship with taxes is about more than money:

“Taxes have become the way we define ourselves as a political commonwealth, or a way of determining whether we still see ourselves as such at all.”

But a recent vote in Oregon shows that talking about taxes in a productive way is still possible.  On January 26th Oregon voters approved two tax increases that had been passed by the legislature and were being challenged at the ballot.  Along with painful budget cuts these two tax measures helped to address a severe state budget shortfall.

Secretary William Galvin has issued a new opinion on the lobbying law which adds clarity to certain key issues that have concerned many non-profits in the past few months.  In a January 21, 2010 opinion rendered to attorney Roger Donoghue, Lobbyist Section Director Alan Cote stated unequivocally that a communication with a covered executive or legislative official IS required in order to meet the statutory provisions for registering as a lobbyist.  In other words, back-room staff, who never talk with legislators, are not lobbyists.

To those of you who have been following this issue, Cote, in an October letter to attorney Carl Valvo, failed to answer this same question.  In this new letter to Attorney Donoghue, he references the previous letter and states that the office, "now finds that absent a direct, personal communication with a covered legislative or executive official by an individual, the participation of that individual in strategizing, planning and research activities does not trigger registration.” (emphasis in the original)

This new interpretation is consistent with Common Cause's view of the statute and that of Governor Patrick’s former chief legal counsel Ben Clements, who chaired the Governor's task force on Public Integrity and wrote the original legislation along with other members of the task force.  Attorney Clements is mentioned in the letter.

The opinion also clarifies the issue of whether non-profit board members who lobby on behalf of their non-profit have to register as lobbyists.  It states that when a Board member is not compensated by the non-profit, despite being a salaried employee of another corporation, he or she does not have to register.