Lawmaker: People will die without taxes for health
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) - Momentum continued to build Friday for a ballot measure to raise state sales taxes, with a top House lawmaker saying sick and elderly people will die if voters don't approve more money to pay for health care programs.
The warning from Rep. Eric Pettigrew, D-Seattle, came as he formally unveiled plans to ask voters to raise the sales tax by three-tenths of a percentage point this November. The proposed tax hike would last for three years, raising about $1.1 billion for health care programs that benefit the poor and disabled.
There's no guarantee yet that the measure will appear on the fall ballot. State lawmakers first need to vote in favor of the bill, and health care interest groups would have to pay for the campaign. Both of those decisions could come in the next week or so.
But Pettigrew, who heads a House spending committee on human services, said the new money is needed to offset the deep budget cuts lawmakers must make to fill at $9 billion shortfall.
If the Legislature doesn't put the measure on the ballot, and if voters don't go along with the plan, "people will die," he said.
"There will be emergency rooms that will bulge, nursing homes that will bulge," Pettigrew said. "There will be people in the street and a lot of people who will not get served because of this."
Tax opponents resisted the drum roll for a voter referendum, saying the state should fund its life-and-death programs first with existing money, even if tax collections have dwindled rapidly amid the economic downturn.
Anti-tax activist Tim Eyman, pushing his own initiative to lower property taxes this fall, accused majority Democrats of deliberately manipulating the voters by cutting spending on sympathetic programs: Nursing homes, hospitals, care for the disabled and insurance for the poor.
There should be a separate circle of Hell "reserved for politicians who are willing to throw the elderly and the disabled under the bus, defund their programs, and then exploit them, using them as props and pawns in their never ending pursuit of higher taxes," Eyman said. "Have you no shame?"
Rep. Maureen Walsh, R-College Place, said the Legislature should find a way to pay for the programs in question with its existing budget.
"I'm just scared to death that if we punt this to the voters ... we're going to end up back here in a worse problem next year," she said.
The proposed sales tax increase finally came to light this week, after months of backstage maneuvering between lawmakers and lobbyists.
The Legislature plans to chop about $4 billion from projected state spending through mid-2011 as it scrambles to deal with the most significant budget shortfall in about 25 years. But health care advocates see a temporary sales tax increase as a way to buy back some programs that would otherwise be cut.
A coalition of interest groups, including hospitals, nurses, clinics and health-service labor unions, has been lining up support for the measure. Those groups are slated to decide early next week whether voter polling shows enough support for a campaign.
If the measure passes, it could yield hundreds of millions in state spending that partially compensates hospitals, clinics and the like for the unpaid cost of caring for poor people.
The bill itself still could be amended. But as it currently stands, it would dedicate about $381 million for health care spending in the next two-year budget. Another $105 million would be set aside for a "working families" tax rebate, which would help poorer Washingtonians offset the effect of a higher sales tax on their personal budgets.
The 0.3 percentage point increase would bump up the state portion of the sales tax to 6.8 percent. Local taxes are added on top of that rate; the most expensive general sales tax in the state is in King County, currently at 9.5 percent.
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The sales tax referendum is House Bill 2377.
The warning from Rep. Eric Pettigrew, D-Seattle, came as he formally unveiled plans to ask voters to raise the sales tax by three-tenths of a percentage point this November. The proposed tax hike would last for three years, raising about $1.1 billion for health care programs that benefit the poor and disabled.
There's no guarantee yet that the measure will appear on the fall ballot. State lawmakers first need to vote in favor of the bill, and health care interest groups would have to pay for the campaign. Both of those decisions could come in the next week or so.
But Pettigrew, who heads a House spending committee on human services, said the new money is needed to offset the deep budget cuts lawmakers must make to fill at $9 billion shortfall.
If the Legislature doesn't put the measure on the ballot, and if voters don't go along with the plan, "people will die," he said.
"There will be emergency rooms that will bulge, nursing homes that will bulge," Pettigrew said. "There will be people in the street and a lot of people who will not get served because of this."
Tax opponents resisted the drum roll for a voter referendum, saying the state should fund its life-and-death programs first with existing money, even if tax collections have dwindled rapidly amid the economic downturn.
Anti-tax activist Tim Eyman, pushing his own initiative to lower property taxes this fall, accused majority Democrats of deliberately manipulating the voters by cutting spending on sympathetic programs: Nursing homes, hospitals, care for the disabled and insurance for the poor.
There should be a separate circle of Hell "reserved for politicians who are willing to throw the elderly and the disabled under the bus, defund their programs, and then exploit them, using them as props and pawns in their never ending pursuit of higher taxes," Eyman said. "Have you no shame?"
Rep. Maureen Walsh, R-College Place, said the Legislature should find a way to pay for the programs in question with its existing budget.
"I'm just scared to death that if we punt this to the voters ... we're going to end up back here in a worse problem next year," she said.
The proposed sales tax increase finally came to light this week, after months of backstage maneuvering between lawmakers and lobbyists.
The Legislature plans to chop about $4 billion from projected state spending through mid-2011 as it scrambles to deal with the most significant budget shortfall in about 25 years. But health care advocates see a temporary sales tax increase as a way to buy back some programs that would otherwise be cut.
A coalition of interest groups, including hospitals, nurses, clinics and health-service labor unions, has been lining up support for the measure. Those groups are slated to decide early next week whether voter polling shows enough support for a campaign.
If the measure passes, it could yield hundreds of millions in state spending that partially compensates hospitals, clinics and the like for the unpaid cost of caring for poor people.
The bill itself still could be amended. But as it currently stands, it would dedicate about $381 million for health care spending in the next two-year budget. Another $105 million would be set aside for a "working families" tax rebate, which would help poorer Washingtonians offset the effect of a higher sales tax on their personal budgets.
The 0.3 percentage point increase would bump up the state portion of the sales tax to 6.8 percent. Local taxes are added on top of that rate; the most expensive general sales tax in the state is in King County, currently at 9.5 percent.
---
The sales tax referendum is House Bill 2377.