Reader comments
Legislature: focus on tax cuts, schools

Yes, lets focus on taxes and how they are spent. There is plenty to go around, like to Cottonwood Mall ($50 million dollars), REAL, and other investment firms. But lets not put any extra funds in to education, no one in the education system has enough money to bribe the Board of Education to acquire loan grants and gifts. Our legislators need to start following the money and find out why it is being used to fund private business enterprises. Fraud, waste, and abuse of tax funds must come to an end in Utah. Utah needs legislators and representatives that can't be bought and sold like a comodity to the hightest bidder. Kill the acts of lobbyist (mostly developers and corporations) and their donations to the self rightous fraudlent hypocrites on capital hill.

I strongly urge the legislature & governor to allow use of the current tax system (not flat tax) for at least one more year. In doing my 2007 state income taxes and in attempting to do my 2008 income taxes I noted anywhere from a $600 to $800 tax increase using the new flat income tax over the current system which allows for itemized deductions for chartitable contributions, mortgage interest, personal exemptions, etc. I only have one child still at home and a modest mortgage so I don't think I'm way out of line. I did get the information on the partial exemptions for next year, the slightly reduced rate & the credit but even with that the flat income tax is a big tax increase for me and I suspect for most other people with families.
Next year, we won't have the option to use either the current tax system or the flat income tax so the legislature needs to act now. Get with the State Tax Commision, they will verify that the flat tax is a big tax increase for most people. Call your state reps with your concerns.

1. Laws against illegals...a state or nation without borders has no country.
-English as the legal language, employers fined for knowingly hiring illegals, illegals returned to Mexico, Mexico gets fined for each one to pay for the expenses, cutoff all public assistance-education, medical, etc to illegals, end the in-state tuition program for illegals.

2. A refundable tax credit for families whose kids attend private schools based on income. This is the only mechanism to provide freedom and to improve education, and keeps the state out of private education.

3. Tax incentives for corporations to locate in Utah.

4. Continued ways to keep the environment clean.

I live out in the Uinta Basin, the oil patch that has been the single greatest factor in driving Utah's economy to buck the national trend of economy downturn. Those days are now over as the oil patch is seeing huge reduction in jobs and rigger activity starting the first week of January. The boom is not only over, but things are grinding down now.

That said, the legislature needs to consider this factor seriously before going and passing tax cuts in a year that may well see far less revenues from sales taxes, and I mean lots less.

Education, small business, law enforcement and social services are where the emphasis of spending needs to go, with any other considerations taking a back seat to the budgetary process.

If Huntsman does not handle this year's budgetary process carefully, even having to refrain from tax cuts, his administration and fellow Republican could well cause an economical debacle that could sweep Democrats back into a majority in the House and/or Senate and governorship in 2012.

And yes, it could happen as there are more good Mormons who are Democrat than many would like to believe, and support for them during such times.

I DON'T WANT A TAX CUT! I WANT BETTER FUNDED EDUCATION FOR MY TWO BOYS!

ANYBODY LISTENING?

Even their own party says they don't want a tax cut but here they are proposing more tax cuts.

Did anyone read where that tax cut is coming from ? Did it really say it is coming from public education?

I hope I'm missing something there because the last play that needs cuts is public education.

Teachers need to be starting out at $40,000 a year.

A good teacher should be making $70,000 - $80,000 a year. That is what I can make in the public sector with the same amount of education that a teacher has to have. In fact I probably had to have less than a teacher because many of them have to get masters degrees to make it....

Cut taxes! BIG CUTS!
The suret way to reduce wasteful spending is to cut the amount of money available for legislators to spend. that way they may get closer to funding the important stuff, instead of spreading enough lard around to buy their own reelections.
Enough bleating form the education establishment!
Sure, we should pay TEACHERS more, but let's do that by cutting the bloated bureaucracy and massive school district headquarters palaces.

As a teacher, I would like to thank last year's legislature for their pay raise of $2,500 and the Christmas bonus they gave us. I would also like to thank the people of Utah for their support of education. I am very grateful. Things like this make us teachers feel valued.

do not cut taxes more. The state does not waste to much. Nothing close to the pork spending of the Feds. It is humorous how the state leaders cut part of the food sales tax due to it being regresive then setting up the flat tax which is 10 times more regressive than the food sales tax. Just wait till next year when the economy slows down then we will see how bad the tax cuts have eaten into the tax base. State employees & teachers will again go without raises for years & state university tuition will increase up to 20% a year as during the last recession. They are trying to cut corporate taxes again. Seems each time corporate revenue increases they cut their taxes & it comes right out of the education funding because by law all corporate tax goes to funding education. I do not like taxes but this state is growing fast so we need major infastructure & education spending. Without an educated workforce & good transportation, busnisses will not expand into utah no matter how low taxes are.

I am a strong conservative and disdain the bureaucracy and pork spending that happens within our governments. However, I must seriously question the judgment of our state lawmakers when I hear that there is likely to be a tax cut this legislative session. Utah�s economy is one of the strongest in the nation now. Yet it is likely the current tax base will not last with the rest of the nation�s economy fearing a recession. What happened to �Saving for rainy day?� You can do more than two things with a surplus. I would expect our legislators and governor to consider other alternatives like saving it, or paying off prior bond issues. Instead politicians are seeking to pass a tax cut in hopes to gain a tax-cutting position for your re-election campaign.

No More Taxes. We need heavy tax cuts.
No More Illegal Aliens. Deport them all .
If we deport the illegals, tax cuts will not effect any education or existing programs. The savings will more than compensate.

I will not vote for any legislator that proposes a tax cut this year!

Send it to public ed!

I will never vote for John Valentine again even though I am a Republican. I don't have anything against him personally, but I stopped believing that he represented my views (and I am a typical Utah County conservative) a long, long time ago.