From the Desk of Duane Sand:

Dear Fellow Taxpayers,

With the 60th Legislative Assembly complete and all the final revenue numbers for the 2005-07 biennium tallied the need to reduce the state’s personal and corporate income tax rates has never been more evident. While the legislature was able to pass a stop-gap measure to dull the pain of skyrocketing property taxes, it did nothing to actually cut tax rates for the taxpayers of North Dakota - who created the state’s unprecedented $630 million surplus!

A lot was said about how the surplus was the result of high oil prices. This is only partly true as most of this revenue was statutorily set aside, and only $71 million of the oil revenue was legally able to be put toward the General Fund.

In the 2005-07 biennium, individual income revenues contributed $587 million dollars to the general fund, corporate taxpayers contributed $232 million to the general fund, and oil tax revenues contributed $71 million to the general fund. As you can see, the impact of the oil revenue to the general fund is quite low. In fact, the only source that contributes more to the general fund than the individual income tax is the sales tax ($842 million).

In November of 2008, along with our Initiated Measure to reduce personal income tax rates by 50% and corporate income tax rates by 15%, there will be a measure to INCREASE the amount of revenue from oil taxes that can be allocated to the general fund by $29 million – and will also make it harder to spend what is left over. This is a win-win situation for the taxpayers and for the state of North Dakota.

This Oil Revenue Measure, HCR 3045, will also be on the Ballot in November of 2008. Keep this in mind: HCR 3045 (the Permanent Oil Trust Fund Amendment) increases the amount of oil money that contributed to the general fund, and our Initiated Measure to reduce personal and corporate income taxes will increase the amount of money you get to keep in your pocket each year.

This year, the Legislature battled strong political winds that promoted the creation of a property tax rebate program that did two things:

1.) Didn’t solve the problem of high property taxes, and

2.) Potentially could INCREASE the dependency of our people on the state government, at a time when the state is pushing all-time-high amounts to political sub-divisions for purposes such as education & roads.

Effective leadership in restraining the growth of state government is one thing that the citizens of this great state demand year after year. I believe we went in the wrong direction. I believe we need to cut taxes!

Review of the 2007 Legislative Session:

Let’s look at some areas that the legislature could have done better controlling the growth of government and letting you keep more of the money you earned:

• General Fund Spending increased 24% NEARLY 5 TIMES THE RATE OF INFLATION (from $1.98 billion to $2.45 billion.)

• The size of general government spending as a portion of total spending increased from 8.5% to 10.5%.

• 293 full-time government positions were created. The state data center says the total population of the state grew by less than 300 people over this same period.

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