Posted on 03/17/2005 8:02:31 AM PST by SwinneySwitch
AUSTIN, March 17, 2005 — Senate leaders on Wednesday said they are developing an education plan that would put $6.7 billion more into public education over two years and scale back the business taxes passed in the House.
Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst said the Senate plan will have bipartisan support. House Bill 2, the education bill, and House Bill 3, the tax-shift bill, passed in the House in the last two weeks largely along party lines.
Dewhurst outlined a Senate plan that will likely differ in many ways from the House version, though details will unfold during committee hearings in the coming weeks.
It will include a low-rate, across the board business tax, sales tax exemptions for people who receive food stamps, more money for bilingual education and an across-the-board teacher pay raise to bring salaries to the national average.
More money would come with accountability standards to ensure it is well spent, Dewhurst said.
“The Senate has resolved to work together to pass a very good and fair bill,” he said.
Like HB3, the Senate plan would decrease property taxes by one-third, Dewhurst said. But HB3 only decreases the cap from $1.50 to $1 per $100 valuation; the Senate wants to pass a constitutional amendment to institute a statewide property tax of $1.
Philosophically, the Senate plan will mark a shift from getting children to finish high school to preparing them for post-secondary training, said state Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano.
It will also focus heavily on making sure students graduate, she said.
“It is very important to us that any dollars we put into this system has a result on the back end, and that result is that we graduate more students,” Shapiro said.
Shapiro said the plan does not rely on gambling for revenue, though both state Sen. Eddie Lucio, D-Brownsville, and state Sen. Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa, D-McAllen, said they think it should.
“I don’t gamble myself,” Lucio said. “But I think we should do everything we can to allow the people of Texas to offer that on local option.”
Both Rio Grande Valley senators also said they are hesitant to support an increase in sales tax, which hurts low-income people the most. They said they would favor a sales-tax exemption for the poorest.
Hinojosa said he supports the Senate plan for a low-rate, broad-based business tax.
“I support a tax across the board,” Hinojosa said. “Everybody’s got to pay their fair share.”
HB3 gave businesses a choice between paying a franchise tax and a payroll tax. When asked about sentiment in the Senate on a payroll tax, Dewhurst replied: “Very cool.”
“Ice cold,” Shapiro interjected.
Senate hearings on the House education bills that passed last week and on the Senate plans are expected to begin on March 29, and a bill should be to the Senate floor by the week of April 18, Shapiro said.
For more details on the Senate proposal, visit www.texaschildrenfirst.com
epierson@link.freedom.com
How about cutting SPENDING?
Senate Tax Plan Ping!
How about diverting the lottery money to education. That's how they sold it to the voters when it was put in place.
Tax happy Texas politicians. "We don't make the products you buy, we make the products you buy cost more".
The schools will still suck regardless.
How about diverting the lottery money to education. That's
how they sold it to the voters when it was put in place.Little Annie Fannie Richard's LIED to us.
Tell me again who's running this state?
It sounds to me as though Texans need to give their state legislators a good butt-kicking and remind them whose money they're spending.
“Ice cold,” Shapiro interjected.
That is because it won't take Texans long to realize that they have been handed an income tax in sheeps clothing. The house members are playing with fire.
The Republican Party
The rate is meaningless without some sort of control on appraisals.
They don't sound like the same Republican Party I grew up with.
You've got this bass ackwards.
The control should be on the tax rate, not the appraisals. The rate should go down by the same amount appraisals go up. We should not pit existing homeowners against new and future homeowners. And I say that as an existing homeowner.
Appraisal caps aren't conservative. They are special interest group politics. Appraisal caps just help a special interest group that you belong to.
Whatever. We have a rate cap, we don't have enough control on the appraisal side. As a result, taxes are skyrocketing. One fool paying too much for a house in an area penalizes everybody. At 10%, we effectively do not have a cap on anything.
By the way, if you do tie the rate and the appraisal cap together, you must still have a rate cap as well.
Higher taxes are not conservative.
Besides, people who stay in one house for thirty years should not be thrown out of it by the tax man.
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