Sorry I did not get back sooner. In an ideal world the unions would agree to wage limitations, but I don’t think they will.

I think that we should recognize that the state does not treat towns equally. I would scrap the ECS formula and pay a capitation to each town for each student of say $2000. Then, I would provide specific aid to failing school systems for specific improvements and enhancements such as free preschool from 3 years old, afternoon study/interest programs, Saturday school and summer programs. It would be a much more transparent and fair system that would not be gamed by certain incumbent politicians(both parties). Citizens would understand what is going on.

The towns would then pay for teachers out of their property tax revenue. They would have to balance teacher numbers and pay as they currently do.

My other hope would be that development is driving a lot of suburbanizing costs for school expansion. To pay for that urbanization, we should charge sales tax on all real estate transactions and let the towns affected keep the money for land preservation/protection and infrastucture improvement. Impact fee legalization would be another approach used in a lot of high growth states, so as to avoid taxing existing residents that gain no value from the development.I do not think it will hurt the builders at all, they will just tend to rebuild in areas with infrastucture rather than in green field areas. I think that is an industry that has been given a pass on taxation, while the rest of the state’s businesses are heavily taxed.

The income tax proposal will drain $10+ million from our town’s economy and we will get $1.5 or so. Our school budget is $77 million, so it will hardly make a dent in our inflation of $5 million for just schools, but will make us poorer to take care of ourselves.

We need the legislature to allow us to have cost controls in our municipalities to solve the rising local burden. The only cost controls that help regard labor because that is 80+% of the town and school combined budget.

Our schools are some of the best performing, at some of the lowest per pupil costs in the state, so we are not wasting money compared to the rest of the state. We all understand that the urban schools are largely failing and they need a new approach. Why not be honest and say that the 10 +/- urban districts need 3 year old preschool, all day and Saturday regular school enrichment, and summer programs for all students? We know we will pay, but at least we know what we are getting and can track how well it works.

Property tax reform and education reform are key if we are to keep everyone from abandoning CT. They are linked, but lets design a plan that actually addresses our needs rather than worry about a soundbite-that has already been done.

What are you willing to bet on a pale property tax relief plan sneaking out of FRB or Approps some time in, oh, the next few weeks?

Or maybe Donny & Jimmy have a news conference set for Monday? They can intro their energy plan and their health plan and their education plan and their property tax plan and their full-time legislature plan and their transportation plan and their …

Oh, wait - it’s too late in the session for complicated plans, isn’t it?

Guess we’ll settle for a full-time legislature and a Mini-Me bond commission for Democrats.

I’m no fan of Jimmy but the reason IrRellevant piped up yesterday and interjected her insanely assinine proposal via news conference is because she’s being ignored where the deals are already being made.

When noone needs you it’s no longer a bully pulpit its just a pulpit. Thats a lesson W and Rell are learning together.

Maybe Jodi and George should have lunch and a god cry together.

What’s wrong with Jimmy & Donny? Isn’t the property tax burden the burning issue of the last 20 years? That and education?

Where’s the LEADERSHIP of the General Assembly? Peevish about that lunch Grandma ate? You know, the one CTK says is “irRellevant”?

LOL indeed.

No one, but don’t spoil the moment – it’s such a happy thought.

I don’t like being told to STFU.

If we were at the roundtable of the Senate I’d be required to speak in a tone and by the rules of the Senate.Here I’m Not.

I’ll continue to call the Governor an idiot until she stops acting like one.

If the very tame remarks that instigated your first comment in this thread upset you so that you were forced into commenting here I suggest you may not be ready for the wild wild west of the internets.

PS- I never mounted a campaign. I accepted the nomination as a “Placeholder” because I knew Aniskovich would be pretty easily beaten and then went out and helped Ed Meyer do just that.

As CGG suggested I did a little reading on you (I knew a bit about who you were before – but now I have the full picture). I just wanted to say that, while I don’t always agree with your methods or ideas, I do respect both your passion and your participation in the political process.

I understand that you are angry at the political establishment in America. There are a great number to reasons why you should be, but if there is one piece of advice I’d offer you, it is not to dismiss all Republicans (or conservative Democrats) as eternally opposed to your POV. There are men and women from all sides of the political spectrum who are frustrated and want change.

Please just keep that in mind before you turn your guns in their direction. And I’d still be happy to buy you that drink.

Thanks,

Chris

Connecticut has a major geographical issue that keeps property taxes high. As I’ve written here in the past, many of the highest income earners in Connecticut work in New York state. Thus, they pay income taxes to NY state and typically don’t pay anything to Connecticut. Even our own Genghis Conn pays no income tax to Connecticut, as he works in Massachusetts (Genghis has said he is not one of the highest earners in the state though). Since a large portion of our highest income earners don’t pay income tax to Connecticut, raising income taxes isn’t going to get any tax revenues from these people. Taxes from these people will start flowing to Hartford only after Connecticut’s income tax surpasses New York’s tax rate.

Connecticut probably has the highest percentage of its worker income earned by people that commute across state lines every day. We’re a small state next to a major urban area in the next state. There are other places with this characteristic: NJ (Philly and NYC, and NJ also has high property taxes); NH (Boston, but NH has no income tax so this is irrelevant for them); Maryland (DC, but MD commuters pay their income tax to MD not DC, same as VA Commuters). But CT is probably the most pronounced of these.

True, people commute into CT from neighboring states. But the car commuters probably cancel each other out, but many more people take Metro North from all the CT stops than young single Manhattanites reverse commuting to Stamford or Greenwich to work at UBS or various hedge funds. There may be a fair number of people commuting from RI to the casinos, but those are lower wage jobs that don’t generate significat income tax revenue.

I think that any attempt to significantly shift the tax burden from property to income is going to run into this problem. There are a lot of commuters. I now work in NY state, and thus am more indifferent to Rell’s latest proposal, since it won’t really affect me any (I seriously doubt municipalities will lower their property tax rates any, but maybe a miracle will happen, and I’ll wind up with lower property taxes and the same income tax rate, which all goes to NY state anyway).

Wow – while I fully expected you might react somewhat negatively to my remarks about your level of civility and the personal tone of your attacks, I had no idea that it would ignite a mini flame war! LOL

Keith, I’m glad you ran for office (in truth I didn’t know that) and I imagine you must thus have some idea of how complex an undertaking that can be. I’m not going to spend a lot of time defending my 2006 run (that wasn’t the subject of my post), but I’ll note for the record that: while it was my first ever run for public office, I managed to come in 3rd statewide (among Republican Senate challengers) and mine was the only district in the state where the margin of victory of the Democrat DECREASED from 2004 to 2006. Oh, and my website was FAR more complete then that of my opponent. I was proud of the run – and I’d be honored to do so again some day.

Anyway, all I was trying to tell you was that you MIGHT want to think about adopting a more civil tone both here and in your general political life. You tend to make wild assumptions about what background we Republicans come from (the only Buffy I know is BTVS) and launch personal attacks (bashing my 2006 outcome, the Governor’s education, etc) rather then addressing issues.

I know I’m probably not going to achieve anything more than becoming the subject of another one of your rants, but I’ll tell you what – if we do a CTLP meetup I’ll offer to buy you a drink and talk politics with you. You might just discover there are some things we even have in common.

Chris

P.S. Thank you to those who were kind enough to say a kind word about me or the campaign (or even just joined in expressing your similar opinion).

And by the way Governor, the fact that Connecticut has one of the highest per-capita property tax bills in the nation might have something to do with the fact that our property values, and income levels, are a wee bit higher than say, Mississippi’s.

I wonder why the Governor doesn’t talk in her press release about the percentage of a family’s income that goes to property taxes. Could it be that the story she wants to tell isn’t helped by pointing out that the Connecticut taxpayers paying the lowest amount of their income in property taxes happen to be the wealthiest families in the wealthiest communities?

I sure hope so.

Yes,

And they give as good as they get.

Fortunately for me I’ve been winning most of the bets and intend on continueing that trend.

“That makes no sense,” he said.

http://www.norwalkadvocate.com/news/local/scn-sa-nor.breakfast3mar29,0,3094274.story?coll=nor-news-local-headlines

Now I have to comment…….. While the above comment was not directed at me, I do find it bothersome. I am not some silly Republican. But I tend to vote that way more than democratic. I mostly try to let the merits of a position influence me more than who’s party it came from. Are those of us who do that rather than vote Demcratic really so silly?

Are other comments like the following really necessary here?

“Just when you thought Grandma couldn’t get stupider she goes and develops alzheimers.” I am sure I am not the only one who posts here who has someone close to them suffering from this illness.

I get upset when I read comments like:

“ACR says your IQ is higher by 20 points than the rest of the members of the Republican State Central Committee” ……

Is there some reason to suggest one party in this state is so dumb it is responsible for the fiscal mess we have here, given that the other party has controlled the General Assembly for years now?

I’ll pass on “BITE ME”……and let the level of that dialogue speak for itself.

And lastly!!!

“Turn off your computer and go watch Fox,you’ll feel much better.”…….That is exactly what I intend to do right now…..I am hoping when I turn it back on the level of discussion will have made it worth while.

How civil.Enjoy your crumpets.