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> Last summer, the Republican speaker of the Texas House Dennis Bonnen was caught on tape gloating: “My goal is for this to be the worst session in the history

> Last summer, the Republican speaker of the Texas House Dennis Bonnen was caught on tape gloating: “My goal is for this to be the worst session in the history of the legislature for cities and counties,” Low service state rolls costs down to counties and cities and then kneecaps them.

throwaway0a5e 6y ago
Alternatively: Low service state makes cities and towns who want to be high service pay their own way. Yeah the quote is pretty bad if you're on the business end of his proposed policies but whether or not those policies are good or bad totally depends on your ideology.
- spamizbad 6y ago
  > Low service state makes cities and towns who want to be high service pay their own way. But they already do. The difference is they get "back" less proportionally. Not a bad thing btw, that's the nature of progressive taxation!
- techsupporter 6y ago
  > Low service state makes cities and towns who want to be high service pay their own way. In Texas, as in many states, municipalities are severely restricted in the types and amounts of taxes they can levy. And, especially in Texas (considering the fight over school funding), the propensity is to further restrict the types and amounts of taxes, not expand them. Most forms of business tax are flatly outlawed. And if a city tries to impose a fee of some sort, the legislature will quickly get around to cutting off that authority. Property tax limits are severely restricted, same for sales tax. For example, transit districts in Texas may not exceed a 1% sales tax and that's only able to be levied in cities that have not used all of their 2% "local option" sales tax cap. Most cities in Texas, levy 1% of the sales tax cap for "general purposes" and then another 1% for "economic development," which should be read as basically giveaways of public money to induce private businesses to locate in those cities. Cities that can't or don't levy economic development taxes are seen as at a disadvantage to the cities with that pot of money. So it's far more complex than "well, high-service cities should just tax more to pay for more."

throwaway0a5e 6y ago

Alternatively: Low service state makes cities and towns who want to be high service pay their own way. Yeah the quote is pretty bad if you're on the business end of his proposed policies but whether or not those policies are good or bad totally depends on your ideology.

spamizbad 6y ago
> Low service state makes cities and towns who want to be high service pay their own way. But they already do. The difference is they get "back" less proportionally. Not a bad thing btw, that's the nature of progressive taxation!
techsupporter 6y ago
> Low service state makes cities and towns who want to be high service pay their own way. In Texas, as in many states, municipalities are severely restricted in the types and amounts of taxes they can levy. And, especially in Texas (considering the fight over school funding), the propensity is to further restrict the types and amounts of taxes, not expand them. Most forms of business tax are flatly outlawed. And if a city tries to impose a fee of some sort, the legislature will quickly get around to cutting off that authority. Property tax limits are severely restricted, same for sales tax. For example, transit districts in Texas may not exceed a 1% sales tax and that's only able to be levied in cities that have not used all of their 2% "local option" sales tax cap. Most cities in Texas, levy 1% of the sales tax cap for "general purposes" and then another 1% for "economic development," which should be read as basically giveaways of public money to induce private businesses to locate in those cities. Cities that can't or don't levy economic development taxes are seen as at a disadvantage to the cities with that pot of money. So it's far more complex than "well, high-service cities should just tax more to pay for more."