----- Forwarded by Isaiah Hugley/Columbusga on 03/05/2008 08:18 AM -----
"Jim Higdon, GMA Executive Director"
03/04/2008 02:35 PM
To
ihugley@columbusga.org
cc
Subject
House to Vote on Tax Reform Bills
Action Alert
House to Vote on Tax Reform Bills
What's Going On?
The Speaker's tax reform package has been scheduled to be heard on the floor of
the House on Wednesday, March 5. He introduced a new version of SR 796 and HB
979 this morning in a House Rules Committee meeting. HR 1246 is no longer part
of the package.
WHAT YOU NEED TO DO
Our greatest concern is SR 796. It is important that every member of the House
hear from city officials on this bill. Please call, fax and email your House
member and ask them to vote NO on SR 796 tomorrow. You are also encouraged to
come down to the Capitol to speak to your House member face-to-face if you can.
What Does SR 796 Do?
1) Freezes the assessed value of all real property at its 2008 value.
2) Limits residential increases to no more than 2% a year.
3) Limits non-residential increases to no more 3% a year.
4) Caps property tax revenue growth to the governmental inflation rate plus new
construction.
5) Allows local governments to increase property tax revenue beyond the
inflation rate only if a local referendum is passed.
Let Your Legislator Know That ...
SR 796 artificially caps assessments and property tax revenues without any
regard to local conditions, local needs or local aspirations.
SR 796 restricts the ability of local officials to respond to local needs and
desires.
SR 796 makes it difficult or impossible for municipal officials to respond to
the unfunded mandates imposed by the state legislature and the federal
government such as indigent defense, immigration and homeland security.
In many cases, cities have been forced to use to property taxes to pay for
capital improvements such as water and sewer upgrades. SR 796 will make this
problem worse.
SR 796 will likely have a chilling impact on the status of outstanding local
government bonds and will certainly affect the cost of local government
borrowing in the future.
SR 796 will limit the ability of cities, as well as counties and schools, to
make needed investments for the future.
It is not good policy to run local governments by referendum. Voters elect
city officials to make those decisions.
Quality of life services and public safety services will suffer from a likely
shortfall in revenues.
Attachments
No attachments for this document.