A new phone blitz is underway targeting state GOP lawmakers and urging them to oppose the $700 million sales tax hike in the transportation plan being hustled in the state Senate.
The push comes from Americans for Prosperity Colorado and state director Michael Fields, who says constituents deserve to know where state lawmakers stand on this tax.
The phone campaign will initially target Senate President Pro Tem Jerry Sonnenberg, R-Sterling, and state Sens. Bob Gardner, R-Colorado Springs, Kevin Priola, R-Brighton, and Jack Tate, R-Centennial.
Fields said they can expect “tens of thousands” of phone calls urging them to oppose the tax, and that other lawmakers might also be targeted in the future.
The Colorado Statesman notes that Anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform organization “came out swinging against the proposed legislation.”
“Some lawmakers contend this regressive tax hike is needed because transportation is a priority,” Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, wrote in a letter to legislators. “Yet lawmakers calling for a tax hike to fund transportation are actually admitting that transportation is their lowest priority. Were that not the case, they would not have funded everything else in the budget first.”
It’s funny how that does seem to happen, a lot. Perhaps because taxpayers might be more willing to increase taxes for things they use, than for state employee pay raises, a new fleet of vehicles for an agency, or new buildings.
We can’t shake the feeling that we’re being suckered into this tax hike deal.