Higher bus fares, motor vehicle registration and titling, vanity tags and more apart of a $14.6 billion state spending plan
“We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle; for there is no such thing as a good tax.” - Winston Churchill
As Maryland attempted for years to grow itself out of a structural deficit that soured way over $1-billion at times, the powers that be have yet to yield to the fiscally prudent advice of the “non-partisan“ Spending Affordability Committee. The committee, established in 1982, is charged with studying and reviewing the status and projections of State revenues and expenditures and the status and projections of the Maryland economy – as directed by (Chapter 585, Acts of 1982). The Committee's purpose is to limit the rate of growth of State spending to a level that does not exceed the rate of growth of the State's economy. Annually, the Committee recommends to the Governor and Legislative Policy Committee the fiscal goals of the State government budget to be considered at the next General Assembly session. Committee recommendations cover levels of State spending, new debt authorization, and State personnel, as well as how any surplus may be used.
However, this group’s recommendations have gone unnoticed as legislative leaders, the Annapolis M.O.B. (Mismanagers of Our Budget), have chosen to increase spending over the past five years, while at the same time increasing tax burden on the citizens of Maryland. Facing a critical fiscal dilemma in 2007, Governor Martin O’Malley, the Democratic Don of the bunch, chose to ignore the problem during the legislative session, yet called a special session to have Democrats jam through a tax package by the tune of $1.4 billion in annual tax increases. Joined by lobbying forces of his “underboss” Lt. Governor Anthony Brown (aka Tony Two-Face), they saw the passage of two bills that answered a few pestering questions at the time: What do they do about the highly criticized yet somewhat popular slots issue? And how do they deal with chronic budget problems such as Thornton and its Geographical Cost of Education Index (GCEI) without the funding source in place upon its 2002 passage?
However, after the largest tax increase in Maryland history, only 4-years ago, how do we yet find ourselves almost in the very position we were then, with increased governmental spending and little revenue to support such irresponsible governing? The House of Delegates, led by O’Malley Capo, Michael Busch (aka Little Mikey), just pushed through a budget bill doubling the fees of multiple services such as automobile titling/registration, which was raised in 2007. Also on the table of increases was doubling vanity plates and land record fees, while increasing transportation fares for services such as local bus, light rail, subway and Baltimore Metro, at the same time effecting MARC train fares. It [House] shifted $17 million of administrative costs for pensions onto the local school boards – approximately $1.5 million in Baltimore City alone. Also looking to please the Don, they left untouched a proposed tax introduced by the O’Malley administration that would tax hospitals a one-time fee of $260 million, while slashing the state’s Attorney General’s Office (Don O’Malley’s Consigliore) by about 11%.
Now up for debate and being proposed in the Senate, under the leadership of Capo, Senate President Thomas ‘Mike’ Miller (aka Big Mikey ), is a laundry list of increased taxes such as an O’Malley backed wind-related tax that could cost the consumers close a $1-billion, as lawmakers seek to cap the tax at $2 per customer. Yet with introduced bad taxes of 5-cents, proposed by Senators such as Joan Carter Conway, who chairs the Education, Health and Environmental Affairs Committee, yet has been unseen and unheard from in the fight to restore the $15 million education cuts to Baltimore City, or even to try and recoup some of the $100 million state cuts to education – proposed by Don O’Malley.
As the state’s Capo di tutti Capi (Boss of all Bosses) Martin O’Malley, recently made the family accept his newest Capo, younger brother Peter, as its Democratic (underboss) Party Chairman, his plan to increase more taxes and decrease spending in education, almost identical to his move four years ago to date, Marylanders have to question who is really running this state? The constituents who put these legislators into office or the O’Malley MOB that seems to institute any policy they deem fit at the time and get away with it, time and time again. Consistently calling former Governor Robert Ehrlich a “liar” for deceiving the Marylanders by saying fee increases were not the same as a tax increase, Don O’Malley and his crew has done the same exact same, yet expecting the voters to side with their rationale now that a fee is a fee, not a new tax? “Many people will believe we are raising taxes, however we are not. They are merely fee increases, separate than that of taxes,” implied “little Mikey” the other day.
Now another legislative family earner, Delegate John Bohanan, Jr. is saying the same by implying that there is a difference as “nobody needs a vanity license plate that says “hot mama”,” thereby making reference to the option of such. However, ask him If the option of titling fees, MTA bus fares and other increases in their proposed tax package are optional as well? If so, then hell we can accept the premise of that raise, however we no longer have that option, as they are not optional and the hard working men and women of this state shall suffer, as the Annapolis M.O.B. again balances the budget off the backs of the poor, middle class citizens that elected them, during an economic time of crisis. With a little less than three weeks many wonder if a compromised budget plan can be hashed out in Annapolis, yet let’s not forget that it took about 20-days in 2007, to condense a full legislative year of work into one three week special session.
As stated back then, still remains true today, as former Senate Minority Leader David Brinkley put it best when he stated: "Common sense and reason went out the window just to give the governor a victory," said Senate Minority Leader David R. Brinkley (R-Frederick). "I think this whole thing has been a debacle, and taxpayers are stuck holding the bill."
“There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it would be good for him.” – Robert A. Heinlein
“The difference between death and taxes is death doesn't get worse every time [the legislature] meets.” – Will Rogers
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