Maine Fire Fighters Campaign Against TABOR

September 21, 2009 – The Professional Fire Fighters of Maine (PFFM), in conjunction with the Citizens Unified for Maine’s Future coalition, has launched a campaign to defeat two ballot initiatives – Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR) and excise tax reductions. The passage of one or both these bills could devastate town and city budgets, forcing local governments to make deep cuts to life-saving services, including fire and EMS services.

The campaign kicked off with news conferences in Portland and Bangor. “In this down economy, we are already working hard just to maintain the resources we have,” says PFFM President John Martell. “It’s critical that we defeat TABOR and the Excise Tax so that we do not experience additional layoffs and other resource cuts.”

TABOR would require a statewide referendum for any increase in spending. This would slow down or prevent fire departments, police departments, the school system, the department of transportation and other service providers from making crucial improvements.

This November election marks the third time TABOR has been on the ballot in one form or another. The first was in 2004 and was called the “Palesky Proposal,” named after the person who led the campaign. “Even though it wasn’t called TABOR, the initiative’s intent was the same,” explains Martell.

Martell worked on the campaigns to defeat the proposal in 2004 and to defeat TABOR once again in 2006. The Maine Heritage Foundation, a conservative agenda group, put TABOR forward in 2006 and is doing it again for the November 2009 ballot.

“It took three tries for proponents of TABOR to get it passed in Colorado,” says Martell. “I think the Maine Heritage Foundation is hoping three times is a charm here, too.” Colorado has put a five-year temporary stop on TABOR because it was so detrimental to the economy there.

“During this current economic crisis, we have already seen layoffs and contract concessions. If TABOR passes, I fear we will be seeing more of that,” cautions Martell.

The excise tax reduction initiative will ask voters if they support a 40 percent reduction on the Excise Tax paid on new cars. Funds generated by those taxes go directly to municipalities. Without those funds, municipal governments could be forced to slice their budgets, including cuts to fire, EMS and other services.

Portland’s city manager has said that if the excise tax alone passed, the City of Portland would see a $2 million budget shortfall as of January 1, 2010. “This is where we have lost 19 fire fighter positions in the last year and where we have diligently been working to bring back some of those positions,” says Martell.

The PFFM and the Citizens Unified for Maine’s Future coalition will be working an aggressively to get their message to the public through public forums, literature drops and phone banking.