Cutting unrestricted local aid to cities and towns across Massachusetts is a non-starter. It is my goal to prevent that from happening, and I believe that one possible solution is a corporate tax amnesty program. JONES: AMNESTY PROGRAM MIGHT OFFSET NEED FOR LOCAL AID CUT By Matt Murphy STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, NOV. 21, 2014.....As House Democrats weigh their options for dealing with a mid-year budget shortfall, House Minority Leader Brad Jones is floating a corporate tax amnesty program as an alternative to Gov. Deval Patricks proposed local aid cuts. Jones, a North Reading Republican, told the News Service he has discussed the idea with House Ways and Means Chairman Brian Dempsey as the Democrat leadership considers its response to legislation filed by the governor to trim $25.5 million in local aid to cities and towns. Collections from a two-month tax amnesty program that ran through the end of October pulled in more than $39 million from roughly 49,000 residents who took advantage of the window to pay overdue taxes without penalties. That amnesty program, passed in the state budget over the summer, applied mostly to individual filers and some business taxes, like sales taxes, but not to corporate taxes. According to Jones, the last corporate tax amnesty program took place in fiscal 2003, and pulled in $61 million in back taxes. Based on the success of it before, even if its not only half as successful, you would wipe out the dollar amount of local aid and maybe have money left over to restore some of the cuts, Jones said. Patrick presented his plan this week to close a projected $329 million budget shortfall, unilaterally cutting $198 million and filing legislation to trim an additional $57 million from the budget, including $25.5 million in local aid, $10 million from the Massachusetts Department of Transportation and $21.8 million from non-executive branch agencies that are outside his authority. House Speaker Robert DeLeo on Thursday said he would not entertain cuts to local aid, but he and House Democrats are still considering how to address the remainder of the gap, and whether to wait until 2015 when a new Legislature is sworn in and formal sessions resume. Jones said he would also be open to offering an extended amnesty period for residents, but would first want to know from the Department of Revenue the level of interest in the program from taxpayers who may have heard about it too late. -END- 11/21/2014
Posted on: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 21:41:51 +0000
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