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Gov. Jim Douglas defended his administration’s proposals in the Challenges for Change progress report released last week.
Douglas reiterated his stance that the Challenges are necessary in order to make government more efficient as income tax revenues continue to decline.
When reporters asked if the state should dip into rainy day funds or raise taxes, they heard a familiar refrain: Douglas said the Legislature should rollback the “damaging” tax increases enacted last year. He said the Joint Fiscal Office has determined that Vermont has the second highest tax burden in the country on a per capita basis. (According to the JFO’s fiscal facts, the state has the 9th highest when state and local taxes are taken into account.) The Legislature’s assumption that raising taxes will raise more revenues, doesn’t necessarily add up, Douglas said.
“We can’t be second highest and expect Vermonters to be able to live in the state,” Douglas said.
Douglas repeatedly backed his administration’s proposals – from estate recovery to cuts in the community mental health system to the mandatory consolidation of schools and the release of several hundred nonviolent prisoners into Vermont’s communities.
He said if lawmakers don’t like the administration’s specific ideas, they should come up with their own alternatives.
“School consolidation is not a new idea,” Douglas said. “We’ve got to find a way to gain an economy of scale.”
School spending has doubled from $450 million to $900 million in five years, he said, and in 2009 schools added 218 employees, even though there were 10 percent fewer children to educate.
“This Legislature should not adjourn without changing (educational) funding,” Douglas said.
