AG tax study commission ignored
Here’s today’s multiple choice question: “What should a school board do when faced with adopting a recommendation from its state-mandated tax study commission?”
A. Approve the recommendation as presented, thinking that the five district residents who served on the tax study commission represent, as intended, a broad consensus of independent people.
B. Reject the recommendation, which is permitted by state law, because the recommendation of the study commission is unacceptable.
C. Change the recommendation presented by the study commission, asking for a personal income tax that is four times higher than what the commission recommended.
Most of us would probably choose “A” or “B,” in keeping with the spirit of the law known as Act 1, the Pennsylvania Taxpayer Relief Act, which was designed to keep school boards from unilaterally doing whatever they want in terms of tax shifting. But if you’re one of the nine members of the Albert Gallatin Area School Board, the correct answer is “C.”
That’s the wrong answer. Unless every other school board is doing the same thing – ignoring their tax study commission’s number and plugging in their own to be voted on in the upcoming primary election – something just doesn’t smell right with what AG did.
The problem, according to former AG teacher and current school board member John Gruskowski, is that AG’s tax study commission “took into account projected gaming proceeds provided by the state.” Gee, it seems to us that Gov. Ed Rendell mentioned, at least a hundred or more times last year, that revenues from slots machines were a big part of the tax relief equation.
Still, it’s easy to see where a tax study commission, with members appointed by the AG school board, could get it all wrong. Especially when, as Gruskowski noted in a recent guest commentary, “We presented the commission with all the necessary financial data that they needed.”
Simply put, it seems to us that Pepperlee Anderson-Naviglia, who chaired AG’s tax study commission, got it right by noting of the work she and four others put into the effort, “It was a colossal waste of our time.” Anderson-Naviglia even says the school district’s solicitor instructed the commission to include gaming revenue in its calculations.
Anderson-Naviglia and her peers recommended a .1 percent hike in the earned income tax, boosting that levy to .6 percent. The AG school board unilaterally quadrupled that hike to .4 percent, seeking to make the tax .9 percent.
What does that mean to the average person? Currently, an AG resident pays $5 tax on every $1,000 of earned income. The tax study commission wanted that to rise to $6, a 20 percent increase. The school board wants it to rise to $9, an 80 percent increase.
Voters will have the chance to approve the change when they cast ballots in April. And it’s true, as noted by Gruskowski, that all proceeds from the higher earned income tax would go to offset school district property taxes.
But income earners, may of whom also own homes, should know that they’re the ones who will be socked at a higher level if the measure is approved. Because of the board’s override, voters should shoot this one down ASAP.