NESCPA Legislative Update - Special Session
July 19, 2024
From the Governor’s press release: “This is unacceptable and it’s accelerating,” said Gov. Pillen. “In a few short years Nebraskans will be paying $1 million a day in property taxes. That’s $6 billion a year. . . .”
You don’t need to be a CPA to know that $1 million times 365 days does not equal $6 billion a year.
Obviously, the importance of your involvement in the legislative and political process couldn’t be more clear than it is right now!!
The Society will be sending a Call to Action to our full membership within the next few days, as the list of exemptions includes several items of concern. Watch your inbox for details. We also are preparing a flier that will be hand-delivered to every State Senator’s office next week.
More information from our lobbyist, Korby Gilbertson, below:
Governor Pillen held a press conference Thursday to introduce his tax package play book. Yes, here we go with the football analogies. You can find the plan by clicking on the following link: https://governor.nebraska.gov/nebraska-property-tax-plan.
The Governor was flanked by Senator Linehan and Senator Clements and opened by showing charts that illustrate the growth in property taxes and restating that educating Nebraska's children is the responsibility of the state so he believes the state should take over education funding which will drastically decrease the reliance on property taxes. He then turned to Senator Linehan to introduce the "comprehensive approach." Linehan provided no detailed information but said that the plan would reduce property tax by 50%, state will fulfill constitutionally required school funding, local control will remain for capital expenditures, public safety will be protected, curbs local spending, halt local governments collecting a windfall every time valuations increase and require local votes to increase spending, and cutting state spending. This will be done by redistributing current property tax credit funds, place sales tax on over 110 currently exempted goods and services. Food and medicine will not be taxed.
As expected, no actual details were provided. Instead, the Governor said that this will all be part of the discussion senators will have during the special session. He reiterated that "everything is in play." Pillen said that property tax is a crisis and anyone who votes red will be against Nebraskans. He has 100% confidence that they will have the needed 33 votes that includes bipartisan support. Pillen was asked when he will issue the proclamation calling for the special session, he said he could not answer the question.
I feel very confident in saying that there is no consensus on the details of the plan and that is where it falls apart. Opposition to the plan continues to grow. I continue to have flashbacks to the EPIC tax plan in that it sounds great on the surface, but once you run the numbers it isn't. Thinking that the Legislature will figure this out in a special session is a risky Hail Mary against a strong defense. Yes, I went there.
In other news, the Nebraska Examiner's Zach Wendling is my new hero! Zach has done a phenomenal job of tracking down details and reporting on the latest developments surrounding Governor Pillen's plan. The following are two articles that provide great information. The first even includes the list of tax exemptions proposed to be removed (it does not include the excise/sin taxes). Finally, someone way more tech savvy than me converted the Examiner's list into an Excel spreadsheet and I have attached that as well.