The President's 2007 Budget

THE PRESIDENT'S 2007 BUDGET -- (House of Representatives - March 02, 2006)

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Mr. BAIRD. I thank my good friend and colleague. This is an important topic, because it strikes at so many issues important to our families back home and the people we represent.

This administration has said repeatedly, no new taxes. What they are not telling you is while they say on the one hand no new taxes, they are in fact passing a host of hidden fees that are tantamount to taxes onto the backs of the American people.

Let me give you some examples that directly impact my constituents, the first of which is, indeed, according to the administration, a new tax. If you listen to President Bush and our friends on the other side of the aisle, they will tell you that if we do not extend the capital gains and dividend tax cuts that go to the wealthiest Americans, that is equivalent to raising taxes. In other words, if you don't extend the tax cut, then you have effectively raised taxes. Yet the President's budget does not extend deductibility of the State sales tax that affects people in my State of Washington and six other States across the country.

How much is this matter worth? Last year our deduction for sales taxes, which we fought to put in on a bipartisan basis, saved the taxpayers of Washington State alone $500 million. If the President believes that we don't need to extend that, then the President, according to his own logic, would raise taxes on Washington State taxpayers to the tune of $500 million a year, which would be $5 billion over the next decade.

A second effective tax increase that is going to strike the Northwest comes from the President's ill-conceived proposals for dealing with Bonneville Power Administration revenues. The President would force Northwest taxpayers and the Bonneville Power Administration to take additional revenues from Bonneville and send them to the Federal Treasury to disguise the true cost of the deficit, rather than using them to lower the power rates, which currently are 50 percent higher than they were before the 2001 energy price crisis, which, not coincidentally, was precipitated by the actions of this very administration.

Friends, if policies of this administration increase your utility bill 10 percent above the current levels, that is equivalent to a tax from an administration that swore it would have no new taxes.

The President also is going to shift critical fees and expenses that also amount to an effective tax onto our local communities through their proposals to cut dramatically the Secure Rural Schools Initiative.

In my district, two of the highest recipients in Washington State, two counties are the highest recipients, Lewis and Skamania Counties, absolutely depend on this money to make their counties operate.

As we have seen curtailments in timber harvests and resulting revenues, these counties have come to depend and desperately need this money for public infrastructure, education and safety, yet this administration would first cut the funding for this program and, second, require that we sell off Federal lands again in a short-term effort to disguise the deficit, that we sell off Federal lands in order to provide the meager funds that would remain.

Our local communities depend on this creative, collaborative effort by environmentalists and timber companies and timber interests to get responsible, practiced harvests in the woods, that would be decimated. We cannot let this go forward.

That the Federal Government would also renege on its fundamental commitment to community safety by cutting this figure is astonishing, up to 80 percent of Federal support for local law enforcement programs.

Come to my district, Mr. President and my friends on the other side of the aisle. Talk to my local sheriffs and police officers who fight the daily battle against the scourge of methamphetamine, other drugs and other crimes. Ask them, can you do without Byrne Grants? Can you sustain the kind of cuts we are talking about in the COPS program? Can we really support further cuts in the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area? We are making progress in the battle against methamphetamine, but increasingly international supplies are coming through our virtually open borders.

Our young people, even middle-aged people are getting addicted to this horrific drug, and this administration says, now is the time to cut funding that the Federal Government provides local communities. It is bad policy, friends, and it amounts to a tax on our local communities because they will be left to pick up the tab of the reduced Federal dollars. And it is a tax on you if your home is burglarized, if your family is assaulted, if your workplace no longer functions effectively because of the effects of this drug. It is a tax, my friends, and it is being levied by the policies of this administration.

Finally, last month, we had a number of folks from our local school boards in my office. And they talked to me about the proposed cuts to critical education programs and the shortfalls in key educational opportunities. We all know that this administration and this Republican-led Congress has proposed to increase the cost of student loans even as college costs are skyrocketing.

But we need to know too that folks who are not planning to go to college, the folks who need a vocational education, who want to learn a trade or a skill will be dramatically and adversely impacted by this ill-conceived budget.

The President has proposed zeroing out the Perkins Grant program which local high schools and community colleges and voc programs absolutely depend on to sustain their voc education program.

It happened to me last month that we had school board members and community college board members in my office one day talking about how devastating these cuts would be. The next day I heard from Josh Bolten, the President's OMB Director, who said everything is going to be just fine.

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