Former GOP Governor Tommy Thompson did a little divide-and-conquer schtick a few years ago up North to raise support for the Miller Park sales tax by urging outstate legislators to stick it to Milwaukee.
Your right-wing, fiscally slippery GOP Governor who piously says he'll never raise a Wisconsin tax (though he already did) could do Thompson one better by raising many DNR fees - - just as he did last year while ending taxpayer support for park operations - - and by adding a few more in his next budget for, say, walking in a state park or canoeing a stream:
And road tolls?, since WisDOT has a deficit dwarfing the DNR's.
Walker's been all over the map on the issue, so stay tuned.
Maybe he could call them a pavement user surcharge or auto-mobility revenue enhancer - anything but a tax, so the Walker campaign ads and talking points continue to appear to be free of the "tax" word.
Your right-wing, fiscally slippery GOP Governor who piously says he'll never raise a Wisconsin tax (though he already did) could do Thompson one better by raising many DNR fees - - just as he did last year while ending taxpayer support for park operations - - and by adding a few more in his next budget for, say, walking in a state park or canoeing a stream:
A] 46-page DNR report also discusses imposing new fees on so-called silent sports:
• Registration fees could be charged to canoeists, kayakers and paddleboarders to help pay for boat launches. About 18,000 already voluntarily pay an $11 fee, but an estimated 335,000 nonmotorized boats are on the water each year.
• Admission fees could be assessed for use of 600 state wildlife, fishery and natural areas. Hikers, cross-country skiers and others who don't hold hunting or fishing licenses now benefit from fees without contributing...
Walker said he is mulling another park fees boost in the $5 to $10 range.Also on the horizon - - letting businesses get into the park with signage, and maybe naming rights.
Welcome to "Insecticide Plant No. 2 State Trail!" Stop and Pay Entrance fee.What's next? An air breathing charge, since the DNR has to do some air quality monitoring?
And road tolls?, since WisDOT has a deficit dwarfing the DNR's.
Walker's been all over the map on the issue, so stay tuned.
Maybe he could call them a pavement user surcharge or auto-mobility revenue enhancer - anything but a tax, so the Walker campaign ads and talking points continue to appear to be free of the "tax" word.
Gotta pay for those tax cuts and direct subsidies to Wisconsin millionaires and out-of-state multinational BILLIONAIRE interests. He can't raise taxes, cuz... That isn't his political brand. It isn't what his overlords tell him.
ReplyDeleteSo what's a dim-witted kochhead suppose to do?
Charge us all up the wazoo for stuff we already paid for, but that Scott Walker squandered!
Are they gonna charge us for the Koch Brothers toilet paper we use at he parks to wipe our @sses too? Now THERE'S a user fee I can get behind!
ReplyDeleteNo wonder he thinks he's a fiscal genius............keep forcing people to pay more for things than they've done before he came on the scene and deny that this is an increase. One has to wonder what he'll do when we're all working at Walmarts or at the very most making Walmart wages and can't afford his increasing fees. He'll probably report that attendance is down in state facilities and sell them off on the cheap to his special interest donors for their own private pleasures. We will no longer be able to recognize the Wisconsin that was before he finally leaves the state! Can anyone imagine the costs to put Wisconsin back together again once Walker is finished with his slash and burn governing?
ReplyDeleteRead between the lines, folks. What this all really means is that Scott Walker has been ginning up a fiscal crisis for years now and the media is complicit with hiding it. They catapult the propaganda that he submits balanced budgets while downplaying or typically omitting:
ReplyDelete1. By law, ALL Wisconsin budgets are "balanced"
2. Scott Walker can only claim his budgets are "balanced" by using accouting tricks and gimmicks that the media constantly tells us he is agains [Big & Bold (tm)]
3. Scott Walker's budgets are not balanced in any meaningful sense of the word. He merely refuses to make debt payments, increasing debt cost to record-levels, or he takes out more debt to cover his deficits.
The transportation fund is reaching a breaking point. By "selling" us the idea of user fees, with the help of a network of disinformation specialists, we are being propagandized to accept toll roads and outright privatization of a massive public function that has served the U.S. well for generations and created our car-oriented transportation system.
It is easy to get people to accept that others, like campers and blah blah blah should pay the costs of what the public has already paid for but that Scott Walker has appropriated for his financial backers.
The next step: Massive privatization of publically-paid-for infrastructure under the lie of "user fees". Don't expect to read an explaination like this in your noooozepaper or on your TEE-VEE anytime.
I agree with everyone, but let's call the snoozepaper and Tea-Vee.
ReplyDeleteThe thing is, DNR only has enough staff to do spot checks on user fees at boat landings and hiking trails. They will need to rely on the honor system. Is there any honor left in Wisconsin? Maybe that is the question.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteLMFTFY:
Anonymous said...
Read between the lines, folks. What this all really means is that Scott Walker has been ginning up a fiscal crisis for years now and the media is complicit with hiding it. They catapult the BULLSHIT that he submits balanced budgets while downplaying or typically omitting: