Speaking Out for Louisiana Citizens
By Pete Abington
SURPRISE SURPLUS
After the governor threatened to cancel LSU football and told us of the dark side of Louisiana if we didn’t vote in more taxes, the governor and the legislature hastily raised the sales tax by an estimated $463.00 Voters need to be explained how we have a surplus when just two months ago the governor claimed we didn’t have enough money to keep the lights on. And, look what has happened. It looks as if we have a $300 million dollar surplus this year. State law says that at least 10% of the surplus must be used to pay down the state employees retirement debt and 25% must be used for the rainy-day fund - a savings account that is tapped during tough budget times. Together these two expenses should take at least $105 million of what is expected in the surplus. The governor put forth the renewal of the sales tax and millions and millions of dollars on other taxes on the tax payers (one of the highest in the nation) only to find out we didn’t need all that much. What will our lawmakers do? - Give some of it back? You can forget that. This governor is running for re-election with a whole new song - raises for many and money to spend. Those surplus funds belong to the taxpayers, not the government and they need to be returned or used to pay down state debt and not used to expand government. Meanwhile our state economy and jobs availability is terrible, but that’s Louisiana.
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