Income tax defenders launch campaign

September 17, 2008 02:58 PM Email| Comments (0)| Text size – +

By Stephanie Ebbert, Globe Staff

With financial giants tumbling, the stock market in turmoil, gas prices high, and people worried about the impact on their pocketbooks, a union-funded coalition today kicked off a tough campaign: Asking Massachusetts voters to embrace the state income tax.

The Coalition for Our Communities was formed to fight a November ballot question that would end the 5.3 percent income tax. The ballot question, if approved, would save the average voter about $3,600 a year but eliminate about $12.7 billion in state funding, which unions, social service providers, and even small businesses say would devastate state services.

"Times are tough. Let's not make them tougher," said Mike Kozlowski, the owner of Greendale's Garden Shop in Worcester and a speaker for the Coalition for Our Communities.

The press conference was held outside Dorchester's Jeremiah E. Burke High School -- newly renovated with improvements that the campaign claimed would be impossible if the income tax is eliminated. Willie Thomas, a veteran special needs teacher at the Burke, recalled the night singer James Brown's peaceful concert message quelled racial tension and saved Boston from riots. "Now it's our turn," he said, urging voters to save their communities by rejecting the ballot question.

Question 1 would hurt thousands of people -- including seniors who rely on state-supported prescription programs, students already paying steep tuition and fees to attend state schools, and police, fire, and emergency workers who could lose their jobs, opponents said.

"It's a reckless and dangerous prescription for healthcare in Massachusetts," said Beth Piknick, a Hyannis nurse.

The ballot question's champion, Carla Howell, countered that the state budget itself is "reckless."

"Our high taxes are reckless and are driving people out of the state, driving out jobs, and hurting families," said Howell, a libertarian who ran for governor in 2002 and nearly succeeded with a similar ballot question that year. "We need to end the income tax to give back an average of $3,700 every year to 3,400,000 workers and taxpayers who desperately need it to pay their bills to avoid bankruptcy and home foreclosures and take care of their families."

Her committee, which ran a petition drive to put the question on the ballot, has less than $25,000 left on hand to fight for Question 1. The opposition, just getting started, has $1.3 million, mostly from teacher and labor unions, according to campaign finance documents filed submitted last week.

Asked how much the campaign would spend to fight Question 1, campaign manager Harris Gruman said, "As much as possible." Gruman, who is also the political director for the SEIU Massachusetts council, noted that the group would have to compete with the presidential campaigns for TV ad time and prices.