Help On The Way In Curbing Future Utah Tax Increases, But Too Late To Stop Provo's Prop 1

Last week in Provo a small group of citizens quietly raised everyone's property taxes for the next 20 years for the purpose of a recreation center or Prop 1 which passed 60%-40%. In a more telling perspective, fewer than 9,000 voters turned out to vote in favor of raising taxes on the remaining 51,000 registered voters. In percentage terms, less than 15% of registered Provo voters were able to vote tax increases on 100% of the property owners in the city. Is this really a fair way to approve tax increases?

Those in favor of Prop 1 were organized and had political mailings, a website, endorsements, and yard signs; those wanting to keep their own money were clearly not organized. We must remedy this as voters and hold accountable officials who publicly signed their names as citizens supporting unnecessary tax increases. We must be ready to organize better to stop future attempts from our city council and to be ready to change city council members.

But for those of us feeling that something more than a simple 50% majority should be required to approve tax increases (which coincidentally includes many people who did favor Prop 1), help is on the way in the form of a proposed Constitutional Amendment. Rep. Carl Wimmer (R-Herriman) announced a proposed Constitutional amendment to "require that any tax or fee increase on the state, city or county level would require two thirds majority vote in order to pass." (ABC4)

The proposed amendment will need to pass a 2/3rds vote through the legislature next year and then require voter approval as amendments A, B, C, and D did this past election.

This is a much-needed amendment, case in point: had this amendment been in place, Prop 1 would have fallen considerably short of the votes it needed and I wouldn't be forced to choke up $80 a year for the next 20 years. Provoans could have then sought a more fiscally responsible way to pay for their want. Those who wanted a rec center could have donated the money they used to fund their taxation efforts into a voluntary citizen donation fund to accrue money over time towards a day when we could build a rec center without raising taxes or forcing citizens to pay for services they do not need or want.

Salt Lake City Code Red Rally

Nacilbupera had the great honor of joining with like-minded patriots on the steps of our great state capitol in Salt Lake City in a last-minute-announced CODE RED rally against the abominable health-scare bill.

We had 200-300 Patriots gathered from all walks of life. We met a patriot (http://twitter.com/evorgsum) who made this fantastic sign (we overheard others commenting on it as well):

We exchanged thoughts and Nacilbupera quickly realized how likeminded and informed she was.

Another great patriot we met was Kathy (above) of Latterdaybanners.com who created this beautiful masterpiece flag just a few months ago. As way of explanation to our non-Mormon readers this flag is of particular symbolism to Mormons: 2,000 yrs ago Captain Moroni was a great military leader who when faced with a hostile takeover of his country by some people wanting to overthrow their judicial system and establish a king, tore his coat and wrote the above saying on it. Captain Moroni then further made everyone swear allegiance to the cause of freedom and a free government else be put to death. Think of Captain Moroni as a General Patton without the profanity: both were die-hard preservers of freedom and devoutly religious.

Speakers at the rally included: Jared Law of the 9/12 project, Diedre Henderson of the Jason Chaffetz campaign, Rep. Craig Frank of District #57 (Pleasant Grove), and Utah US Senate GOP candidates Mike Lee and Cherilyn Eagar. (US Senate candidate Tim Bridgewater was also present, but did not speak.) The speakers freely discussed neighboring issues such as state sovereignty and the crowd expressed opposition Bennett's reelection when solicited.

Jared Law urged us to call Governor Herbert and have him sign HB67 (sponsored by Carl Wimmer and co-sponsors including our Rep. Keith Grover): to have federal health-scare mandates passed after March 1, 2010, not apply to Utah and HB251: to have employers use E-Verify. HB67 has a growing number of states with similar legislation (see current map) across the country and is one Nacilbupera urges Gov. Herbert to sign. Jared also urged us to "fast and pray"--as our founding fathers did many times--that the bill be defeated.

Mike Lee quoted from James Madison's Federalist Paper #62 which was extremely appropriate considering the crypticness of an unwieldy, 2700-page health-scare bill before Congress:

It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow.

Cherilyn Eagar spoke exclusively on health care, talking about the American Medical Association's (AMA) support for the bill and how the AMA only represents a mere 17% of physicians. She urged us to instead support the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) and to sign the petition at http://www.takebackmedicine.com/ When Nacilbupera next seeks a physician, we will be looking for one that doesn't belong to the AMA and preferably belongs to the AAPS. Eagar also spoke about her father, a physician, coming home after Medicare first passed and saying: "today is the first day of the end of quality medicine in America." How true those words have turned out to be!

The protest carried over to Matheson's office a couple of miles south where, if we are not mistaken, there has been a protest going on virtually every day this week. Although we weren't able follow the protest, it seems we may have helped make an impact: Matheson formally announced his plans this afternoon to vote NO on Obamacare!