Bacon's Rebellion

As expected the Senate Finance Committee this afternoon killed a proposal by House Republicans to finish implementation of the car tax cut by phasing out the remaining 30% over the next six years. The move leaves intact state reimbursement for the locally-imposed property tax at an aggregate of $950 million annually. At present, that amount covers approximately 70% of the tax for the average affected car owner. The commitee action comes two days before House and Senate budget conferees are expected to begin negotiating differences in the respective proposals.

Vince Callahan (THE chairman)
Lacey Putnet (Senior member, 44 years, token ‘Independent’. Wink. Wink.)
Kirk Cox (Herr Ideologue)
Leo Wardrup (Fearless old salt, UNC graduate)
Phil Hamilton (Token Centrist. For real!)
Johnny Joannou (Has chip implanted in his head to receive messages from the Speaker.)

On page 1A above the fold and on page 1B (Metro) The Washington Post does it again today. Instead of helping citizens understand how to overcome congestion and lack of mobility, they spend prime media exposure and resources on the funding of transport facilities.

Nowhere do they indicate that building new roadways or rail extensions will only make congestion worse on a regional basis unless there is Fundamental Change in human settlement patterns. That is true no matter how the facilities are financed.

No new roadway, toll or not, and no new rail extension, no matter how funded, can be “built around” or “bypass” congestion. The reason is that the root cause of immobility and lack of access is a dysfunctional distribution of travel demand.

EMR

Prolific Chris Graham over at the Augusta Free Press is reading the fine print of an economic development announcement. I don’t think the powers that be want anybody doing that.

Oh, and is it just me, or is Del. Chap Peterson the AFP‘s darling?

Is this really a safety measure, or a clever way of discouraging hunting by taking all the fun out of it?

While Arlington and Loudoun Counties roll in dough, Bristol appears to be seriously hurting.

Update: Norm Leahy over at One Man’s Trash has some suggestions for Bristol.

In a little-noticed piece of legislative sleight-of-hand today, members of the House and Senate amended General Assembly rules in a manner that gives them until midnight Wednesday, Feb. 16 to agree on state spending (the budget bill), but two additional days, until midnight Friday, Feb. 18 to identify where the money comes from! What’s the signal? The spending side is seen by the players as relatively easy, a scuffle could be shaping up on the revenue side. At least it’s going to take longer to hug and kiss. Whose ox gets gored? Stay tuned! If Friday deadline holds, conferees likely will begin cutting and pasting minor differences Saturday. A programming note: they changed the rules today. Can do same thing tomorrow. And the next day. And so on. Read all about it: see HJR 944 (patron is Griffith). You read it here first.

Unfortunately our conservative Virginia is becoming the ultimate nanny state.

We covered the droopy drawers bill ad infinitum—enough said on that. Today The Washington Times reported on the following caretaker bills:

• A bill to fine drivers $250 for showing X-rated videos in their vehicles if passersby or other motorists are exposed to them
• A bill to require libraries that receive state funding to install Internet filter systems on their computers that will prevent children from being exposed to porn websites
• A bill making it a misdemeanor to fondle oneself in public
• A bill that bans “up-skirt” photography

Don’t get me wrong, I’m in favor and support all these initiatives. But do we need to create laws for just about everything? What comes next, codifying common sense and good manners?

Becky Dale, a Virginia FOIA savant who wears the Bacon’s colors and writes out of this stable, rounded up–as an independent study project–a collection of E. B. White’s New Yorker pieces while completing her MA in English at VCU. The collection was published by HarperCollins in 1990 as ‘E. B. White: Writings from the New Yorker 1925-76.’ So yesterday, I get home to find this week’s New Yorker, the 90th anniversay issue, and therein a splendid profile on White by his step-son Roger Angell–a long-time New Yorker scribe himself. White wrote mostly short stuff and children’s books–notably ‘Charlotte’s Web’–but is probably best known as the re-write genius of William Strunk’s ‘The Elements of Style,’ famously referred to now by devotees as simply ‘Strunk and White.’ It is to simple, declarative, active-voice writing what the Old Testament is to the Bible. A slender volume–I’d guess less than a hundred pages–it has been a whiskey-drinking-frame-of-mind companion to me for 35 years.

The apparent darling of this blog, Warrenton Mayor and Republican gubernatorial candidate George Fitch, looks to be making the rounds of Virginia papers.

Allison Brophy Champion (What a great name! What great initials!) has an interview with Fitch in the Culpeper Star-Exponent.

He’s singing my song:

For the most part, said Fitch, Gov. Mark Warner has done a good job in bringing a business-like approach to Richmond. “But I don’t think he’s taken it far enough,” Fitch added.

During the last biannual budget process, there was too little attention given to cutting the expense side, said Fitch, and too much haste to raise taxes.

I was going to do a post on this subject as a spin-off from Becky Dale’s Quorum article, but I’ll let Fitch do the heavy lifting: “Fitch said each and every one of Virginia’s state boards and commissions could be done away with since ‘they serve no pressing need.’”

Speaking of heavy lifting, where are the real wonk posters today?

Let us pause from our relentless bashing of the House of Delegates for this kind characterization from Warren Fiske of the Virginian-Pilot:

Some lawmakers describe the disagreements between the two Republican-controlled chambers as a biorhythm of the legislative process; after all, the legislative bodies were created as a check on each other.
The House, up for election every two years, is a boiling pot of ideas. The Senate, which faces voters every four years, traditionally takes a more deliberative and long-term view.

This should quiet those who say many House measures are half-baked. They’re boiled!

What was the point of this stunt? And how did a variation make it to the Richmond Times-Dispatch editorial page?

In my current Virginia Pundit Watch column, I noted a Sunday op-ed in the Washington Post by David Brunori, a contributing editor to State Tax Notes magazine and a research professor of public policy at George Washington University. He strongly defended the local property tax.

Brunori was on-line today, taking reader questions and sticking to his guns on the overall fairness of the local property tax system. If you think your locality is taking in too much money, throw the supervisors out was his prescription.

At least two NVA readers complained about subsizing other parts of the state, including this gem:

I advocate secession from the rest of state.

Subsidizing the rest of Virginia is not my goal with my tax dollars. Last year Fairfax County residents got back less a quarter for every tax dollar we sent to Richmond. 50 cents of each of my tax dollars should come home to Fairfax County.

Given the unrelenting assault on family budgets in NOVA, with higher property taxes, last year’s tax increase (the largest tax increase in the history of our State), the proposed toll increase on the Dulles Toll Road, just to list a few, I find it preposterous that any elected official from NOVA would vote for even higher taxes against NOVA residents.

I’m not surprised that Sen. Mary Margaret Whipple would propose greater tax burden on her own constituents (SB 1099 – Motor Fuels Tax; Additional Imposition in the NOVA Transportation District), while Richmond is diverting NOVA’s taxes to other parts of the State. She’s after all a Democrat and that’s what they believe in.

But I’m shocked, shocked that any Republican Senator representing NOVA would vote for this abomination. Unfortunately, Jeannemarie Devolites Davis (R-Vienna) and Sen. Bill Mims (R-Leesburg) voted in favor of this bill.

The Spotsylvania Board of Supervisors has voted 5-2 in opposition to adding a reactor to the North Anna Nuclear Power Plant. They cited conerns about the water level in Lake Anna and the fact that they are one of the fastest growing regions in Virginia.

Wonder where they expect the electric power new residents will require to come from? Wonder if they’re ok with the coal-fired plants outside their jurisdiction that Barnie says are killing 1000 of us annually?