State News Quick Hits: To Cut or Not to Cut?

A battle over New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s proposed property tax cuts is heating up, with protesters pouring into the New York State Capitol in Albany last week, a new TV ad hitting the airwaves, and the introduction of alternative tax cut plans from the Assembly and Senate. The governor’s plan would “freeze” property tax increases over the next two years by giving a refundable tax credit to homeowners for the amount of any increase in taxes over the prior year (and only to those living in jurisdictions complying with a 2 percent property tax cap and showing an effort to consolidate services with neighboring jurisdictions). In the third year, the freeze would be replaced with an expanded homeowner circuit breaker property tax credit and new renter’s tax credit. State legislators and many local leaders have voiced unease with the proposal. The Assembly’s plan would skip the freeze altogether and simply offer the homeowner and renter circuit breaker credits with less restrictions.

Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan has called for a state constitutional amendment (PDF) to charge millionaires a tax surcharge and use the resulting $1 billion in revenue to fund public education. The proposal is likely the first of many attempts by both political parties to define the electoral turf prior to the gubernatorial election in November, which the Chicago Tribune has dubbed the “governor’s race of a generation.” Current Governor Pat Quinn is running for re-election against Republican Bruce Rauner, who happens to be a multimillionaire. Even if the constitutional amendment doesn’t make it on the ballot (it would first have to be approved by supermajorities in the House and Senate), voters will face a stark choice on taxes: the state’s temporary income tax rate increase is set to decrease in 2015, and the two candidates will likely have different views on how to make up the lost revenue.

Most Oklahomans don’t want lawmakers to enact the income tax cut approved by the state Senate last month. A new poll reveals that when voters are told about the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy’s finding that much of the tax cut will flow to the state’s wealthiest residents, 61 percent of voters oppose the plan compared to just 29 percent in support. Even among voters who aren’t told about this lopsided impact, less than half support the rate cut, and fewer people support the cut than did so last year.

Colorado spends roughly $2 billion per year on special tax breaks and a new law just signed by Governor John Hickenlooper (backed by the Colorado Fiscal Institute, among others) ensures that basic information about those breaks will continue to be made public going forward. Colorado’s Department of Revenue published the state’s first comprehensive tax expenditure report in 2012, and now the department is required to update that information every two years. Our partners at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) explain that “a high-quality tax expenditure report is a bare minimum requirement for even beginning to bring tax expenditures on a more even footing with other areas of state budgets.”