MARCH MADNESS: CCI GOES TO STATE
Over the past few weeks CCI has been traveling to Bismarck to attend committee hearings and legislative sessions. Of the over a thousand bills that have been introduced we have concentrated on just a few, mostly those that affect the individual liberties of North Dakotans.
One hearing we attended was a hearing to study eliminating all property tax in ND. Could you imagine the economic boom it would be for ND if this could be done? Now that would be a stimulus package with no strings attached! There is an additional measure HCR 3046 that would have put an amendment to abolish property taxes in North Dakota on the ballot for the citizens to decide this issue.
At the hearing, this testimony was given by Minot Attorney Bob Hale. "Property taxes take $716 million out of our family budgets each year. There is no better way to empower the family and put money where it will do the most good, back in family budgets and in the hands of those who have earned it. Property taxes mean you never own your home—you merely rent it from the government. No one knows this better than our elderly and those on fixed incomes, who, after living in the same house for 30 years and paid it off are forced to move because they cannot afford their property taxes. Property taxes are a disincentive to business and our government leaders know this. That is why they use property tax abatement to attract new businesses into the area, adding to the tax burden of homeowners and established businesses. The only solution is to abolish property taxes. The question of course is "How do we replace the revenue that property taxes provide?" Two years ago the legislature increased state spending 23.5%--even though our population did not increase. The amount of increased spending was enough to replace property taxes. Over the last two years the state sales and income taxes you paid exceeded state spending by $1.3 billion. Instead of increase state spending yet again, this money could replace the revenue raised through property taxes."
As our nation enters an economic downturn, North Dakota would be the only state in the country that has no property tax. We would be a magnet to every business and industry in the nation and we won't have to spend a dime for Economic Development to do so.
This would mean our small communities will have the same level playing field as larger cities when trying to attract businesses. Right now a small community can't afford to offer the economic development incentives that the larger cities can. But with no property tax, a city like Valley City would be able to easily find new tenants for the empty buildings we have without stressing our city budget.
Our state would attract young families who are not able to afford to buy a home in other states. No property taxes will spur the home building industry, adding jobs to the state which would add to both sales and income taxes.
Within hours of the committee hearing on this measure an AP story about abolishing property taxes in ND went nationwide on forbes.com, yahoo, and many others. Clearly this would attract people to our state.
As far as local control goes, we have been staunch supporters of local control and we have a track record that shows that. It appears that we have lost a lot of local control already. If you go to both the city and county commissioners and corner them on the ever increasing property taxes they have repeatedly said that it's the state's fault not theirs. We believe that if this measure is done correctly it can have a positive effect on local control.
As this story was being updated the house voted this down. Representives Metcalf and Meuller voted no. Representative Koppleman, the chairman of the committee that heard this issue, put an amendment onto the measure that took a good bill and made it into a bad bill where even the the bill's sponser voted against his own bill. That's the kind of stuff that goes on in Bismarck that usually doesn't make the news. However, there is a lot interest accross the state to initiate the measure and still let the people decide in November 2010.
There is also a bill that we supported, HCR 3049. This resolution would cap government budgets (state and local) at the current years level with an inflation adjustment based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI). That is what is currently in place with people on fixed incomes. The measure even allows for an option to go to the voters for more if the need is there. That is more generous than the government is with people on fixed incomes.
In the last 10 yrs state spending has increased nearly 70%. During that same time inflation has risen nearly 43% but the average wages have only increased 41%. So while state spending has outpaced inflation, the average wages of the citizens of North Dakota have not even kept up with inflation. While we are earning less our government is spending more.
This measure does not cut any budgets. It only means that government budgets should not increase more than the family budget. Neither does it mean that there can never be any increase in spending. It just means that if there is a need for taking more from families, the taxpayer gets a say in the matter.
As this story was being updated the house voted this down with only Representatives Bellew, Damschen, Dosch, Kasper, Kempenich, Nathe, Porter, Ruby, Thoreson, Wald, Weiler, and Wrangham having confidence in the Citizens of North Dakota to vote yes. Representives Metcalf and Mueller voted no.
We attended a three hour hearing on limiting extraterritorial zoning, that is the area around cities that for the past thirty years the cities have been able to dictate to the citizens that happen to live in the ET Zone ranging from 1/2 mile to 4 miles out. We are very concerned about cities being able to put rules and regulations on citizens that have virtually no redress. At least two fundamental rights are trashed in this zone, the right to vote for or against those who are regulating and the right to petition for or against those who are regulating, in effect regulation without representation. While there was a lot of great testimony given we feel the best was given by Mandan resident Richard Hammond. He covered all the bases. His testimony is on our web site www.valleycitycci.com.
Fargo Mayor Dennis Walaker attended this hearing, although he didn't testify personally it was interesting to see his emotions. The mayor had written the committee a letter explaining why the cities needed the power to regulate outside of their jurisdiction citing a road placement screw up that a township had done that ended up costing Fargo 4 million dollars to fix. It sounded fairly reasonable until the Stanley township attorney took to the podium and line by line, point by point took apart Mayor Walaker's letter. The mayor's face could not have been any redder. As it turns out the city of Fargo had approved the placement of the road all those many years ago.
This extraterritorial zoning bill HB1554 passed 52 to 40 with Metcalf voting yes and Mueller voting no.
We also took in the industrial hemp hearing. Representative David Monson has been pursuing this for over 10 years and he is hopeful that some day soon North Dakota farmers will be able to grow industrial Hemp here in ND. This would be very helpful for agriculture in our state and at the same time make it almost impossible to grow marijuana, because the industrial hemp would cross pollinate with the marijuana and make it virtually worthless for drug use.HB1549 passed House 88 to 4 with both Metcalf and Mueller voting yes and passed the Senate 40 to 1 with Senator Robinson voting yes, clearing another hurdle toward growing hemp in ND.
There is a resolution that we are interesting in, HCR 3040. This resolution calls for the United States not to merge with Canada and Mexico A concurrent resolution urging Congress to withdraw the United States from the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America and any other bilateral or multilateral activity which seeks to create a North American Union. HCR 3040 failed 67 to 27 with Metcalf and Mueller voting no. For more information on this please go to http://www.americanpolicy.org/pdf/2008NAUFS8.5x11%208%20page.pdf
While at the Capital we took in some legislative sessions. Those can be very interesting. On one occasion the house was debating to enact a law requiring abortion facilities to offer the women who come to them for an abortion an ultrasound 24 hours before an abortion would be performed. Representative Kathy Hawkins from Fargo complained that it was unfair to ask the mother to sign an additional piece of paper saying that the facility did offer an ultrasound. Representative Bette Grande, also from Fargo, informed Hawkins that the law right now requires a signature from the woman requesting an abortion to have an abortion performed and that they would just add an additional line to that form. Representative Hawkins then brought up a woman's right to privacy and why do we need to keep track of abortions anyway. Once again Representative Grande explained that the clients privacy is protected and that their names are not used and that only the statistics are reported and that is how we know "that 14,000 babies were killed last year in the state". With that said the vote was taken and the proposed law passed the house overwhelmingly with only Representative Hawkins and just a few others voting no. Metcalf and Mueller voted yes. Just an interesting side note, Representative Grande is married to Don Grande who grew up, in part, in Valley City.
There are a number of other bills that we are watching closely. If you haven't gone to Bismarck to take in a legislative session we strongly urge you to. Get involved. If you'd like to attend a hearing or session contact us and we'll find room for you to come along with some of us.
_____________________________________________________________
|