Senator Slom Legislative Update Day 50

Senator Slom talks about taxes and other bills in his 50-day legislative report. Recorded April 15, 2010.

Bad Bills on Fast Track to Passage

State Senator Sam Slom

Bad bills that will do more harm to your pocketbook through increasing taxes and fees or reducing tax credits, passed out of both houses of the State Legislature yesterday. The bills are being fast tracked by the majority party to ensure that the Governor takes action on them within the next 10 working days as prescribed by law while the legislature is still in session.

If Governor Lingle vetoes any or all of the bad bills, the legislature will be able to override her vetoes before the session is adjourned on April 29.

I voted “no” on the following bills recently passed out of the Senate:

HB 2866: Taxes the transfer of a taxable estate located in Hawaii by a nonresident who is not a citizen of the United States; adds a “death tax”.

HB 2421: This bill increases the barrel tax from 5 cents per barrel to $1.05 per barrel of oil with different portions of the tax going into various special and revolving funds related to environmental response, energy security, agricultural development and food security. In a previous draft on this bill, the tax was as high as $1.55 per barrel. Supporters wanted an even higher tax of $5 per barrel. The supporters of this tax want to force Hawaii consumers away from fossil based fuels into other alternatives. If this bill becomes law the price of gasoline will rise by at least another 2.5 cents per gallon. The price of everything else that is relies on transport will go up.

SB 2405: Like a bad penny from hell, the “Streamlined Sales Tax” bill keeps on coming back. This is a new tax on all internet and mail order purchases from out of state vendors. Will increase the cost of goods and services sold. The bill has been deferred in the House to April 19.

HB 1985: This bill extends the sunset date for various increased fees from July 1, 2013 to July 1, 2014. The measure repeals the tax deduction for political contributions, increases various cigarette taxes and doubles the cost of certain types of insurance producer license fees.

SB 2159: I voted against the raising of the traffic abstract fee. The current fee is $7. The new fee under this bill will be $13. This is being used as a general fund revenue generator which may raise an additional $6.5 million in FY 2011.

SB 2650: The majority party proposes to stop proposed changes to the Dept. of Human Services by throttling the administration’s plan to close most of the walk-in DHS facilities and layoff of about 210 people. The administration plans to take most of the operation to online electronic processing.

SB 2402— a new 12.5% tax on condo and homeowner association maintenance fees (recommitted to conference committee).

Several other bad bills were passed by the legislature earlier this month with most now in the conference committee. They include the following: HB 2239—extends the bottle tax to dietary supplement, wines and spirits; HB 2667—State run ferry system study; HB 2200— among the many items in the proposed State Budget are more taxes, and some reinstatement of classroom instruction days. The budget bill is still a work in progress and like all the bills mentioned in this article, I also vote “no” on the budget bill. All bills have to pass final reading by April 29, 2010 unless the session is extended.

2010 Hawaii Pork Report

Senator Slom comments on the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii’s 2010 edition of the Hawaii Pork Report. You can find the Hawaii Pork Report at this link: http://www.grassrootinstitute.org/press-releases/2010-pork-report-released

Senator Slom 40 Day Report

5 minute video clip of Senator Slom’s 40 day legislative wrap-up.