Oregon

2010 Special Election

 

Oregon: Making Corporations Pay Their Fair Share

In Oregon there will be a special election held on January 26, 2010 to approve a tax fairness reform plan passed by the legislature that protected 97.5% of taxpayers.

Voting Yes on the tax fairness measures (66 and 67) will protect nearly $1 billion in vital services like education, health care, and public safety. These funds preserve class sizes, save jobs for teachers, provide seniors with in-home care, and provide health care for thousands of Oregonians through the Oregon Health Plan.

In this time of economic crisis, Oregon’s tax fairness reforms protect those who have been hit the hardest—seniors, children and the unemployed—without putting more of a tax burden on the middle class in these difficult times. In addition to excluding the first $2,400 of unemployment payments from state income taxes for those that have lost their jobs in this tough economy, the reforms increase the $10 corporate minimum income tax for the first time since 1931 and raise the marginal tax rate on personal income above $250,000 by 1.8%.

Some large corporations and high-paid lobbyists are working to overturn these legislative reforms. Voting No on measures 66 and 67 will result in a tax cut for corporations and wealthy individuals at the expense of vital services like education, health care, and public safety.

As the Salem-News has reported of this corporate-backed No campaign, "The central argument by opponents of Measures 66 and 67, that the measures will cause Oregon to lose jobs, is 'without merit,' according to experts at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. They said the claim rests on 'misleading analysis' and 'fatally flawed assumptions.'"

The petition drive to place the measure on the January 2010 was led by Russ Walker and Kevin Mannix, who both have a cozy history with “racketeer” Bill Sizemore. Sizemore not only recently filed to seek the GOP nomination for Oregon Governor, but was also recently indicted for tax evasion.

News reports have detailed that more than half of the signature gatherers working for the corporate veto of the tax fairness measures have criminal convictions including for forgery, theft, and stalking or sex offences. Additional reports have also revealed that “two of the petitioners had been convicted of sex crimes, including one convicted of the sex abuse of his daughter in 1990.” In total, background checks confirm at least 82 arrests and 37 criminal convictions associated with the right‐wing campaign’s signature gatherers.

The Vote Yes for Oregon campaign has fought back against these moneyed interests with a TV ad campaign to protect critical services and middle class taxpayers.

 

Two measures qualified for the statewide ballot.
Both measures are veto challenges.

Ballot Measure 66: Fiscal/Budget Issues

Fiscal/Budget Issues: This measure raises tax on household income at and above $250,000 (and $125,000 for individual filers).  It also reduces income taxes on unemployment benefits in 2009. The measure maintains funds currently budgeted for education, health care, public safety, and other services.
Proponents: http://voteyesfororegon.org
Opponents: http://www.stopjobkillingtaxes.com

Ballot Measure 67: Fiscal/Budget Issues

Fiscal/Budget Issues: This measure raises the $10 corporate minimum tax, business tax, and corporate profits tax.  It also maintains funds currently budgeted for education, health care, public safety, and other services.
Proponents: http://voteyesfororegon.org
Opponents: http://www.stopjobkillingtaxes.com

2010 General Election

Signature Deadline in 2010: July 2, 2010
Number of Signatures Needed to Qualify: 82,769 (statutory initiative); 110,358 (constitutional amendment)
Gubernatorial Election in 2010: Open Seat
US Senate Election in 2010: Wyden (D)

 

Bill Sizemore and his cronies have filled 20 ballot initiatives thus far for the 2010 ballot. It is also interesting to note that several of the initiatives that have been filed for 2010 are do-over's of issues which he has tried to pass multiple times in the past including a "right to work," a "paycheck deception initiative" and several "super majority" initiatives.

Additionally, the conservative “Common Sense for Oregon” has filed 24 initiatives for 2010, many of them duplicates of past or current Sizemore initiatives.

While there are a total of 65 ballot initiatives filed for the 2010 election it is unclear as to what will actually gain legs. Only seven ballot initiatives have been approved to circulate -- requirements for sustainable forestry practices, cuts to local property tax revenue, mandatory minimum sentences for certain crimes, regulation of chiropractic practice, marijuana legalization, and one that would reform current medical marijuana policy. Finally, an effort is under way to place a “personhood” initiative on the ballot that would be a blanket abortion ban.  This so-called “personhood” initiative is part of a national right-wing effort to end a woman's right to choose, ban several of the most medically safe forms of birth control, restrict common fertility treatments, such as in vitro fertilization, and put an end to stem cell research.

For more information on the ballot initiative process and activity, visit http://www.ouroregon.org.

2008

For more 2008 election information, click here.

 

For additional information please check with the Oregon Secretary of State: http://www.sos.state.or.us/