The Governor's budget
Although they did have the local New York City CBS station, my hotel in Granada, Nicaragua didn't cover Governor Rell's budget address. But I did get a chance to breeze through her address here.
Hmmm... what can I say? A higher state income tax? No thank you. I'm not a fan. I know the idea of spending more money on education sounds good, but CT is already $36 BILLION in debt with our underfunded postretirement benefits. I really wish somebody would address that. Unfortunately, there's not a big constituency clamoring for it. And since no one is screaming about it, everyone in Hartford seems to forget about it. And of course, there's the millions of dollars being wasted over at the DOT. I-84 and Rte 42 are in Cheshire. I wonder how many other places around the state are having money flushed down the toilet by that agency? Have any DOT staff been given the heave-ho yet?
Back to education though... don't get me wrong, it is important. But I think it's a local issue. So instead of raising state taxes, I'd much prefer that the state simply untie the hands of municipalities and let us address education at the local level... as it's been done for centuries in CT.
My one other sticking point with her address was that while she mentioned the manufacturing aspect of alternative fuels, and while we are already capable of consuming alt fuels, I didn't see her mention distributing alt fuels. And with no distribution network in place, we can't really use alt fuels in a significant way... at least not in the cars we drive from home to work and back everyday.
As I skimmed through, I did catch at least one interesting idea... increased funding for college tuition. I'm not sure if the idea is for grants or loans. But I don't see much of a downside to the increasing available funding for loans.
Bottom line though, I don't see Governor Rell having much of an impact on this budget. Jim Amann and Don Williams both have supermajorities. In my opinion, the responsibility for a fiscally responsible budget lies on their shoulders.
Any comments? I'm guessing most people are not happy about the income tax hike.
Tim White
Town Council, 4th District
8 comments:
Old political trick. Raise taxes "for education" so that anyone who is against it is "against the kids". Then, after the tax is in place, move the money to the general fund and spend it any way you want.
She lied to us. If we wanted higher taxes we could have elected the mayor, he had progressive ideas.
I am lol bc the Republican gov has proposed higher taxes.tax and spend Republicans. Oh man dig your way out of that hole.
Just like the Repulicans that we have in Cheshire, they want to waste money just on what they want.
Rell is very dumb; nothing she says is anymore than parroting what she's told. For the towns with education systems that are working well and fully funded the increase in the incime tax would lower the local property tax but she failed to explain that because it wasn't in the script she was handed to read and she did read it BTW. All of that said, her budget is the usual half baked "Bettty Crocker" crap that will have to be sorted out by the legislature and thye're no prize either.
4:35 Before you call someone "dumb" let's review:
incime - should be - income
Bettty - should be - Betty
thye're - should be - they're
Oh and anon 4:13 - it's Republicans not Repulicans
lol
Cheshire is getting approx. $65k more than last year, I am sure Cheshire residents will be sending much more than that to the state. So again towns like Cheshire are big losers in this budget. And there is no property tax relief, none.
Will Jodi be ponying up money for typing class, too? She didn't say but I could use a little brush up.
signed 4:35
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