I’ve got no soft spot for Utah’s Republican machine but the piling on of Mark Walker seems way too petty to me.
There is some talk that pursuing Walker will bring other legislative unethical behavior into the light but it really seems to me that Utah’s Democrats and their allies are in danger of serious overreach in their pursuit/persecution of Walker.
The Utah Foundation released a study today on historical trends in taxation and spending in Utah. They included this graph on education spending.
I really didn’t know that education funding had been in such a decline relative to our state’s economy or the rest of our state’s government spending over the decades (see the whole summary report). It is a lot harder to be impressed when our legislature brags about education increases when one notes that education spending as a percentage of our economy has declined to such an extent over the years. It is also harder for me to sympathize with those who stubbornly argue that Utah can’t afford to do better than last in the nation when it comes to per pupil spending when the information from this graph is considered.
Thanks legislators for the increases in ‘08 and ‘09. Would you mind bringing relative public education spending back in line with what was being spent in 1991 when I graduated from high school? I’d sure like it if you tried a little harder not to shortchange my kids.
Check out the whole Utah Foundation Report and Summary.
H/T KVNU’s For The People
Major Kudos to Obi Won Liberali for his excellent post on property tax issues in Utah. In his comments section he wrote that he’s “taking a swim in Jeremy’s pond” by posting on the issue. Wrong. His post is a far better analysis than I’d be able to come up with.
It will be interesting to see how things go when assessment notices are sent out in Davis County this year. The southern part of the county was re-appraised last year and homeowners cried bloody murder at the tax increases they received. The assessor’s office has re-visited values in most of the rest of the county this year and tax levies are being decreased across the board. It will be interesting to see how the decreased levies and increased assessments effect the newly re-appraised cities and neighborhoods mostly located in the northern portion of the county. I’ll post again when more information is available.
More and more often I find myself agreeing with the The Sutherland Institute and their policy positions. This new essay takes me even further down that road.
Kudos to these authentic conservatives for a stance on immigration that actually makes sense. It is so refreshing to see self proclaimed conservatives move beyond the standard “I oppose illegal immigration because it is illegal” argument. Nearly all of the ills presented in this standard anti immigrant argument would be alleviated if the immigrants were made legal and permitted to work within our system as natural citizens do.
I haven’t read the whole essay yet but am curious how far down the immigration road Sutherland is willing to go. Are they also arguing for open borders? It is hard to justify support for making illegal immigrants legal while also arguing in favor of closing the border to others who would come here to make better lives for themselves if they could immigrate legally. I’ll report further after I’ve read the whole essay.
H/T KVNU’s For The People
I had never been to a precinct caucus meeting before tonight. The meetings for Democrats and Republicans in district 16 were held at Northridge High School in Layton. The Democrats had about 20 people in our meeting while the Republicans probably had 8 to 10 times that number and had to use the school’s auditorium.
The Democratic caucus went well. I especially appreciated meeting Carole Peterson, candidate for the legislature. Her background as former chief clerk (30+ years) of the Utah House of Representatives makes her an excellent candidate in this race. She’s seen the political misdeeds of the Republicans who’ve run the capital for the past few decades. She knows for certain what needs to change and how to make those changes. I emptied my wallet and donated what I could to her as soon as the meeting was over. We need representatives who will be responsive to their constituent citizens and who aren’t part of a graft producing machine. Ms. Peterson spoke about her respect for the importance of the office she’s running for and her long career of careful non-partisan service as chief clerk of the House testifies of her sincerity. Anyone who can help her campaign out or donate really should. Beating Kevin Garn won’t be easy…but its not impossible either. If anyone can do it in our area of Davis County I’m betting it is Ms. Peterson.
There wasn’t a lot to vote on in the caucus. Democrats don’t have multiple candidates for any office up for election this year in our precinct so we had a good time meeting each other and called it a night. As our meeting adjourned the Republicans had just ended their large group meeting and had broken up into smaller groups. They were going up the stairs while we were going down. I saw several people from my ward, including my Bishop, following the herd upstairs.
There were times leading up to tonight when I had considered joining that herd only because it sometimes seems so hopeless for Democrats in Davis County. As I watched the dozens of Republican men and women who filed past the handful of Democrats we had I knew for certain that there was no way I’ll be switching to Republican. There is no logical reason for there to be such a political imbalance in our community. A significant portion of the Republicans I saw have exactly the same policy priorities our Democrats have but they’ve accepted the foolish cultural dogma that only Republicans represent their values. Utah’s political environment would be far more dynamic, ethical, and trustworthy if there was real partisan competition in our state. I’m glad I participated tonight if only to do my small part in helping that happen. Utah deserves better than we’ve currently chosen for ourselves. I’m hoping and acting on the belief that our situation is reversible.
Because there apparently aren’t enough real criminals to pursue in Utah, Attorney General Shurtleff wants everyone to remember that he’s looking to fine people who bet on March Madness brackets this year.
Utah: The state where it will always be illegal to be an adult.
UPDATE 03/11/2008 11:07: I like VOU’s proposed solution to the silliness that is Utah’s extreme gambling prohibition.
Tom made an interesting comment on this post about SB2 (the education omnibus bill) that I’ve been thinking about for a couple of days. I think he’s probably right.
This omnibus bill may be unconstitutional under the Utah Constitution. (See Article VI, Section 22)
One argument in favor of calling it constitutional would be to consider it an “appropriations” bill, which is partially true. However, the constitution requires it to be a “general appropriations bill”, which I would argue it is not. (See SB1 for an example of a general appropriations bill.) Further, there are stand-alone sections of the bill (e.g. lines 469-491, which come directly from HB 419, a bill that had no appropriation), which give further evidence to the notion that this bill has a) more than one subject, and b) the title (”Minimum School Program Budget Amendments”) does not accurately reflect the body of the bill, both of which are constitutional requirements of bills.
It’s clear in my mind that at the very least, the intent of Art VI Section 22 was violated by the omnibus approach.
I’m no lawyer but it does seem that Tom has a point. I was pretty disappointed that the legislature was able to throw all this stuff into an Omnibus and get it passed as one bill. Commonsense dictates that the people aren’t well served when legislators can avoid voting on substantial changes to Utah law and new programs by sticking them together with essential appropriations in an omnibus bill. It seems that Utah’s constitution is on the side of commonsense in this case.
Thank you Tom!
Here is an interview Brian Schweitzer (Democratic governor of Montana) recently had with NPR. It is very short and sweet and forceful explanation of the foolishness that is “Real Id”. Give the interview a listen then try to imagine Gov. Huntsman being that cool. Pretty hard eh?
It would sure be nice to have a chance to support a candidate like Mr. Schweitzer in Utah. Do you think it is possible that a state like ours, so heavily influenced by cultural Mormonism, could ever elect someone known for his willingness to kick butt in the fight for our freedoms and rights instead of someone well-known because he’s really rich, really pretty, and really Mormon?
Bob is right again (no surprise). This wasn’t a tax shift…it was a tax increase used to give subsidies to Utah’s business interests.
I’ve been self employed and may do it again in the near future. I’d love to get help with health insurance costs but not on the backs of my fellow Utah taxpayers.
Again…where is the vaunted Utah Taxpayer Association? This is very clearly a new tax on everyone meant to benefit Delta Airlines and a few small business owners. Is Barbara right in her comment on this post? Is UTA really just another business lobby willing to throw citizen taxpayers under the bus if it benefits their donors?
UtahTeacher has done a great job breaking down the political hack job our legislature is doing to public education through use of an omnibus bill containing many pieces of legislation that likely couldn’t pass if voted on individually. Republicans stuck these ugly measures together with all the positive legislation the public education system needs so they could avoid having to debate the wrongheaded bills.
I understand that politics can be ugly but this is ridiculous. Several of the items stuck in this bill have already been voted down in committee or on the floors of the house and senate this year.
Have we really gotten to the point where the legislature can’t get business done in a way that allows the people to know what is actually being voted on? Cramming all education legislation into an omnibus bill at the last minute does a diservice to Utah’s taxpayers and voters. Legislators should have the courage to give each measure an up or down vote.
It is ironic that Sen. Stephenson, president of the Utah Taxpayers Association, is one of those evangelizing about how great an idea this is. You’d think someone interested in what taxpayers think would want each measure that will cost taxpayers to be considered individually on its merits.
Full Personal Disclosure: I am currently employed by the Davis County Assessor Office as a Certified Residential Appraiser. This blog post represents my own opinion only.
KVNU’s For The People blog posted the entirety of an article by the Utah Foundation explaining Utah’s property tax system and how it works.
Utah’s “Truth in Taxation” property tax law has proven to be an excellent restriction on the growth of this tax for Utahns. Every home or business owner should read the Utah Foundation’s brief on how it works.
Are there steps that could be taken to ensure Utah’s property tax burden is distributed more fairly? Definitely.
1. Counties should be required to re-assess every parcel within their borders every year to ensure problems like those in the 2007 assessment of southern Davis County don’t happen again. Obviously this would require that assessor offices in each of the counties be adequately funded and staffed.
2. Utah’s status as a non-disclosure state for real estate transactions needs to be changed. All property sales should be public record as is the standard in nearly every other state in our country. The current system ensures an unfair tax break for high-end properties and a higher tax burden for owners of average or smaller homes.
3. Better enforcement or revamping of greenbelt exemptions should be examined. Many large property owners and developers are bearing far less than their fair share of the tax burden because they take advantage of greenbelt status.
4. The availability of circuit breaker property tax exemptions for destitute home owners should be expanded. We shouldn’t hear of people being taxed out of their homes in our state because of increasing property taxes.
Thanks for KVNU/FTP and the Utah Foundation for some excellent and useful information!
Sen. Buttars came out against his own bill (mentioned a couple times on this site) because it would make an incredibly dumb law.
I’d love to know where the change of heart is coming from. It is possible that he truly didn’t understand its implications when he sponsored and has now seen the light it but I doubt that is the case. It is more likely that this is part of his damage control process after several bad “public relations” moves.
In the end it doesn’t really matter. Kudos to Sen. Buttars for putting this bill out of its misery. It really was an ugly one.
H/T Senate Site (Note: The Senate Site’s “Morning Workout” posts are a really cool way of following news on the legislative process. I follow the links every day. Thank you SS!)
Yeah…I’ve got it and its nasty. I haven’t been around everyone’s favorite militant progressive at all lately but his symptoms sound like what I’ve got. It stinks.
Since I’m tired and miserable I’m only going to link to other people today and call that fulfilling my blogging responsibilities:
Bob Rules. Sign the petition.
Paramaphil thinks Sen. Margaret Dayton is worse than Buttars when it comes to stupid racist statements. He makes a great argument. Who would have thought someone would say something even more stupid than the “black baby” comment.
For The People catches Sen. Buttars in a lie.
David at Pursuit of Liberty links to an excellent description of why the free traders are right and Lou Dobbs is an idiot.
Frank Staheli thinks American militarism is expanding in a very real and scary way. As usual he’s right.
RudiZink points out that the legislature is owned lock stock and barrel by real estate developers who would sell their own mothers for a little more easy month. We should spend a little less time focusing on fools like Sen. Buttars and more focusing on the blatant corruption on display daily from the legislature. Thank you WCF.
Utah may have its problems…but our local blogosphere rocks.
The NAACP and others who are opposed to Sen. Buttars agenda have so focused on trying to take advantage of the Senator’s stupid comments that they’ve turned him into a hero for Utahns who are sick of having to worry all the time about political correctness and multi-cultural hyper-sensitivity.
If Sen. Buttars were really a malignant racist don’t you think he’d be the one proclaiming real racism from the rooftops like he does his bigotry against homosexuals? He’s never shown himself to be shy about sharing his real thoughts on any topic.
Now the left has turned him into a hero for those in Utah (and there are a lot of them) who think society already focuses too much on political correctness. I predict that Buttars will become a hero not just to the looneys at Eagle Forum but to most active Utah Republicans because of the persecution he’s receiving over some obviously dumb and insensitive but generally harmless slips of the tongue.
Think I’m wrong? Spend an hour or so looking at the comment thread (300+ comments) on this KSL story about the NAACP being offended at Sen. Buttars. If the NAACP wanted to make itself even more irrelevant in our state their overplaying of the political hand they’ve been dealt in this case is the perfect way to do it.
