Proposition 101 is a city initiative to raise funding for Tucson’s road repair, Police Department, Fire Department and paramedic services. The funding is slated to come from a 25 percent increase in the city’s sales-tax rate from 2 percent to 2.5 percent. Undoubtedly, all of these services are worthy, necessary, and important assets for our Tucson community. For this reason, city politicians have endorsed Prop. 101 with glossy voter information packets, public speeches, rallies, etc.
All are championing this proposition through rose-colored glasses. However, what is not mentioned is that very real victims exist if Prop. 101 is approved: Tucson’s local retailers.
Save for a few exclusions, any retailer within Tucson city limits is required to collect and remit city and state sales tax. Currently those rates amount to 8.1 percent of the sale. This has been an ordinary business process for a very long time. Unfortunately, the sales-tax system has eroded to become the most unfair and discriminating tax in modern America.
The problem is this: By clicking around on the internet and finding retailers located outside of Arizona, a Tucson consumer can buy a $16,700 Canon office copy/printer machine, a $21,300 Chevy V8 replacement engine, a $15,950 Viking refrigerator, a $20,540 Echelon outdoor barbecue, and a $20,000 Samsung LED TV, all totally free from sales tax.
With thin margins already, every local Tucson retailer is placed at an insurmountable 8.1 percent disadvantage to out-of-state Internet competition. As a longtime employee at a small Tucson business, I see this happening every single day.
While our politicians look the other way, Tucson loses millions of dollars of state-shared and sales-tax revenue every year because of this loophole. The absurdity of the situation speaks for itself.
Many other states are actively fighting to get their local businesses on a level playing field. Our city and state politicians are content to pass the buck when it comes to addressing the issue. In regard to Prop. 101, increasing the sales tax is the easy way out for them. It gets the city out of a perceived jam by raising their collective hands and asking the voters for an additional $250 million. Simultaneously, our politicians continue to show careless disregard for the jam that their inaction on internet sales has put Tucson’s retailers in.
Ballots need to be turned in by May 16. A vote of “no” to Prop. 101 challenges our politicians to finally act for tax fairness. A vote of “no” to Prop. 101 shows our politicians that Tucson tax dollars do not grow on trees. A vote of “no” to Prop. 101 challenges our politicians to raise funding by organically growing their tax base. A vote of “no” to Prop. 101 challenges our politicians to stop taking the easy way out. A vote of “no” to Prop. 101 challenges our politicians to control their spending so that items such as bulletproof vests for our police officers are no longer unaffordable.
Finally, a vote “no” to Prop. 101 prevents an expansion of what has become the most unfair tax in America. Until sales tax becomes a fair tax, it absolutely must not be raised.
