With Apologies to Bill Maher, I thought I would steal his famous segment.
New Rule: You can’t advocated slashing necessary services, especially if you have a column and pretend to be a journalist, and you do NOT know what those services do.
A group of Dane County introduced a \"wheel tax\" to help raise money for valuable services.
The so-called “wheel tax” would cost residents an extra $20 a year to register their vehicles. It would maintain services for low-income people that otherwise faced cuts in what Dane County leaders have called the toughest budget process in their history.
“The bad economy does make it difficult for individuals and the government to pay for things, but it also means we need human services even more,” Supervisor John Hendrick said.
Yet every “true -believing Con” from from Blaska to Schubert to a of falsely named \"conservative\" Dane County Board members.
The Wheel Tax could be $15 to $25 per vehicle. It is estimated to raise about $5,000,000 annually. That is the equivalent to raising property taxes an additional 5 percent. Rushing through a wheel tax on top of a property tax increase of 4 percent (the County Executive’s proposed budget) is unconscionable.
Supervisors Bruskewitz, Clausius, Ferrell, Gau, Imhoff,
Jensen, Martz, Solberg, Schlicht, Wiganowsky, Willett
Dane County Board of Supervisors
Quick time-out: I personally have two vehicles (a Dodge and a Buick for those keeping score at home). i also pay approximately $5300 in property taxes. Two vehicles @25 a piece = $50. Which amounts to less than 1% increase in my taxes. So please don’t pretend to be “conservative” when you math is that bad. Ok back to the new rule.
Brenda, as always, does a great job of breaking down the devastating cuts. Here are some “lowlights”:
* A 35% cut for Homeless Shelters. Merry Christmas, now you and your kids go find a manger to sleep in.
*
I heard in addition to the Tenant Resource Center cut of $19,490. Read more here.
– I got the call that they have zeroed out all of the middle school youth resource centers (after school/summer programs). This is about $8500 per center I believe.
– CAC received word that we will be cut $41,767…. From a current level of $170,493 to $128,726.
– Youth Services of Southern Wisconsin – County is recommending $120,000 of cuts to services we provide.
– Centro Hispano – 50% cut to our youth programs. 35k
So New Rule, if you have not talked to one homeless family, or spent time with Centro Hispano or do not know what CAC even stands for, then you can’t vote to slash these services so drastically and pretend to be a conservative. Especially as easy as this group wastes county taxpayer money!
Its not too late to to sign onto Brenda\'s Letter!
PS: I actually personally oppose the “wheel tax” because I do not like the bait and switch. I believe in just raising everyone’s taxes to cover what we need to support these services.
“A society is judged by how it treats its most vulnerable” Mahatma Ghandi.
