The state House began deliberations over their $56 billion fiscal 2024 spending proposal on Monday by rejecting a Republican plan to include money from a newly enacted millionaire’s tax along with the rest of revenue when calculating mandatory taxpayer rebates.
“This is a simple amendment, but one that we feel is still very important,” state Rep. Kim Ferguson said. “The amendment removes the exemption of the millionaire’s tax revenues deposited into the education and transportation fund from counting toward allowable state tax revenues under Chapter 62F.”
Representatives will likely spend most of this week arguing over exactly how and where to spend billions in state revenues during fiscal 2024, before the spending package is sent to the Senate for revision and, eventually, to Gov. Maura Healey for her veto or signature.
Before any vote on the budget itself can occur, lawmakers must first dispense with the over 1,500 amendments that representatives have filed to the original package unveiled by House Ways and Means Chair Aaron Michlewitz earlier this month.
An amendment offered by state Rep. Brad Jones aimed to include any money raised by the state’s new Fair Share Amendment, a 4% tax on income earned over $1 million, in the pot of cash used to determine when the state must send taxes back to residents under Chapter 62F of the General Laws.
That’s what happened last summer after the more than three-decade-old law’s existence was made apparent by its triggering for just a second time since its passage in 1986 and residents saw about 14% of their 2021 taxes unexpectedly returned.
After voters passed the millionaire’s tax in November and constitutionally dedicated any money raised by taxing high-income residents toward education and transportation costs, this year’s budget was offered with a provision exempting that money from 62F calculations.
Republican leaders in the lower chamber were quick to cry foul.
“The proposed exclusion follows no justification, as all other taxes, including taxes constitutionally designated toward specific uses like the gas tax, are included in the current calculation,” Ferguson told her colleagues on the House floor Monday.
“Making further changes to the voter-approved law will continue to upend the will of the voters who sought to make sure that excess tax revenues are returned to the taxpayers whenever they exceed a cap tied to wage and salary growth,” she continued. “The legislature should not be unilaterally making changes to the voter-approved law. We should either put these changes before the voters as a statewide ballot initiative or hold hearings across the state to gauge taxpayer support.”
Upending the will of the voters is a practice with recent precedent in the Massachusetts House of Representatives, Norfolk state Rep. Mark Cusack replied, before encouraging his colleagues to reject Republican efforts and keep the money raised by the millionaire’s tax apart from 62F calculations.
“I appreciate my colleague from Holden’s comments about protecting the will of the voters. As chair of Marijuana Policy in 2017, I heard no such urgency or complaints around changing the will of the voters when we rewrote the entire Question 4 law,” he said. “I ask that my colleagues join me in rejecting this and protecting this new source of revenue.”
The proposal was rejected by a vote of 25-130.
Herald wire service contributed.