A recent article in the Lexington Herald-Leader reports that another cigarette tax being passed in the upcoming Kentucky General Assembly is not likely. The idea apparently has been tossed around in light of the $161 million shortfall for the current fiscal year. Avoiding another tobacco tax is a good thing.
Why, you ask? Because Kentucky doesn't have a revenue problem. Kentucky has a spending problem.
Here are a few suggestions to trim state spending:
- Conduct the efficiency study to eliminate wasteful spending that the governor promised during his campaign. To this date the study has not been done.
- Repeal prevailing wage legislation.
- Re-prioritize time within state organizations that spend a lot of their resources keeping tabs on state think tanks. The Kentucky Department of Education and the Commonwealth of Kentucky Department of Information Systems combine to account for nearly 9% of the traffic at the government transparency site FreedomKentucky.org, sponsored by the Bluegrass Institute. Even more they combine for nearly 15% of the traffic to this blog!
So, state government, since you're reading this, please put your intelligence gathering to good use and take notes on the above suggestions.
2 comments:
Maybe its good the state is keeping an eye on Bluegrass Institute. Perhaps they will learn something!
State government personnel need to quit whining, stop blaming everything for their budget situation, and make some tough decisions. It's obvious to all of us the world has changed, the fiscal condition of our country has changed, and Kentucky state government can't be bailed out by others and taxpayers forever. How about some state leaders taking ownership for their spending and knock it off? How about lean and mean? It is way past time.
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