Berryman Calls on Jenkins to Say How She Would Pay for Her Irresponsible $3 Billion Tax Plan

Posted: Jun 13, 2012 at 8:59 PM [Jun 13, 2012]

 

(ADRIAN) – Former State Senator Jim Berryman, who is a candidate for the House of Representatives, today called on Representative Nancy Jenkins to be open and honest with the people of Lenawee County and tell them how her $3 billion tax plan would be paid for.  According to the analysis of House Bill 5729 from the non-partisan House Fiscal Agency, the price tag for the Jenkins tax proposal is over $3 billion during the life of the plan. 

 

“To put forth a tax plan that costs over $3 billion without telling the people of Lenawee how it’s paid for or what cuts will be made to offset the plan is not only fiscally irresponsible, it’s reckless,” said Berryman.  “The people she represents deserve to know how much she would cut education, health care for the most vulnerable and police and fire protection to pay for it.” 

 

While Berryman supports tax relief for working families, he believes that a responsible public official would explain how a proposal of this magnitude would be paid for. 

 

Even one of the most influential Republicans in Lansing agrees that Jenkins should “stand up and say what we’re not going to fund.”  Senator Roger Kahn, the Chair of Senate Appropriations Committee, told Michigan Information & Research Service (MIRS)[i] that he has concerns that we cannot afford the plan without drastic cuts to the social safety net.   

 

According to a recent Detroit News[ii] article, Jenkins claims that her proposal will not result in cuts to state services.  Jenkins goes as far as to say that, “we have more money than we need as a state."  This is after she voted to cut education spending by nearly $1 billion last year to fund a $1.8 billion tax cut for corporations.

 

Further proof of election-year politics at work is that the Jenkins’ tax proposal is phased-in over a longer period than she would be eligible to serve in the House of Representatives. 

 

“The last decade is proof that the state cannot predict revenue from one year to another, let alone what it will be in 2018,” said Berryman.  “Because of the actions of this Legislature over the past year and a half, it is disingenuous to now propose a tax plan, in an election year, when citizens of Lenawee County are seeing their wages cut and some are losing their jobs.”

 

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