Campaign Spotlight

Oregon Ballot Measures 66 and 67: Making Corporations Pay Their Fair Share

In Oregon there will be a special election held on January 26, 2010 to approve a tax fairness reform plan passed by the legislature that protected 97.5% of taxpayers.

Voting Yes on the tax fairness measures (66 and 67) will protect nearly $1 billion in vital services like education, health care, and public safety. These funds preserve class sizes, save jobs for teachers, provide seniors with in-home care, and provide health care for thousands of Oregonians through the Oregon Health Plan.

In this time of economic crisis, Oregon’s tax fairness reforms protect those who have been hit the hardest—seniors, children and the unemployed—without putting more of a tax burden on the middle class in these difficult times. In addition to excluding the first $2,400 of unemployment payments from state income taxes for those that have lost their jobs in this tough economy, the reforms increase the $10 corporate minimum income tax for the first time since 1931 and raise the marginal tax rate on personal income above $250,000 by 1.8%.

Some large corporations and high-paid lobbyists are working to overturn these legislative reforms. Voting No on measures 66 and 67 will result in a tax cut for corporations and wealthy individuals at the expense of vital services like education, health care, and public safety.

News reports have detailed that more than half of the signature gatherers working for the corporate veto of the tax fairness measures have criminal convictions including for forgery, theft, and stalking or sex offences. Additional reports have also revealed that “two of the petitioners had been convicted of sex crimes, including one convicted of the sex abuse of his daughter in 1990.” In total, background checks confirm at least 82 arrests and 37 criminal convictions associated with the right‐wing campaign’s signature gatherers.

The petition drive to place the measure on the January 2010 was led by Russ Walker and Kevin Mannix, who both have a cozy history with “racketeer” Bill Sizemore.