MMA stakes reputation on Question 1 Tax relief plan 1 of 3 on ballot

AUGUSTA – Although there will be three choices for property tax relief on Tuesday’s ballot, the issue would not even be up for discussion if not for the zealous efforts of the Maine Municipal Association to place Question 1A before voters in the first place.

With a formidable campaign war chest of $1.5 million – including nearly $1 million of its own funds – the MMA has waged a take-no-prisoners battle to secure a majority vote for Question 1A on Nov. 4.

Several analysts and campaign strategists agreed this week that anything less than a clear mandate for the 1A citizen initiative paints a gloomy picture for the outcome of any future vote on the proposal. They also warned that without a clear victory, the MMA could temporarily diminish its respected voice in the Legislature – a critical setback for a municipal lobbying agency that voluntarily placed itself on a collision course with lawmakers and the governor’s office over the property tax issue.

Political scientists like Sandy Maisal, director of the Goldfarb Center for Public Affairs and Civic Engagement at Colby College, already are predicting none of the three sides will receive a majority, making a second election inevitable.

“I don’t believe anyone will get 50 percent, although I also believe that the pro-1A people are those who are most involved and committed in this particular issue – but that won’t be driving people to the polls in this election,” he said. “People will vote on who they like and the [campaign] surrogates. The media could have done a better job in sorting out these issues where a referee function was clearly needed.”

Sponsored by Citizens to Reduce Local Property Taxes Statewide, Question 1A promises local property tax relief by requiring the Legislature to identify funding sources to raise the state’s share of local education expenses next year to 55 percent at a cost of $264 million. The state currently funds education reimbursement at about 41.4 percent with the 58.6 remainder borne statewide by local property taxpayers.

Mainers For Responsible Property Tax Relief, a political action committee raising money for the Question 1B campaign, are supporting the competing measure crafted by Gov. John E. Baldacci and the Maine Legislature. The plan phases in additional education funds over a five-year period until the 55 percent goal is reached. A third ballot option, Question 1C, allows voters to reject both the citizen initiative and the competing measure.

The MMA and the governor’s office met several times in an attempt to find some middle ground on the property tax question to avoid a showdown at the polls. Representatives of each side have privately accused the other of either not negotiating in good faith or not negotiating at all. When the Legislature convened to approve the governor’s competing measure in August, the MMA fired off a series of e-mails to local municipal officials urging them to contact their state representatives to oppose 1B – a strategy that 1A PAC representatives had earlier claimed would not be pursued.

Plurality pitfalls

The failure of the singular effort to protect Question 1A from the threat of a competing measure likely will haunt the MMA in the months ahead if the proposal does not pass with a solid majority. Under state law, if neither Question 1A or 1B clears the 50 percent plus 1 threshold, the option receiving the greatest number of ballots will be considered next June as an unopposed question as long as it has received at least 33 percent of the total number of votes cast. If 1C receives enough votes to deprive 1A or 1B of at least one-third of the vote, than 1C would prevail which means that, conceivably, if 1A and 1B each receive 32 percent, 1C would win with 36 percent of all ballots cast. There also is ongoing speculation within the Department of the Secretary of State, that a legal argument could be made for both questions to come back to the voters if 1A and 1B each receive a third or more of the vote. And in the highly unlikely event each question receives exactly 33.3 percent of the vote, Deputy Secretary of State Julie Flynn said she was uncertain of how the process would proceed.

“I think that in that case, you’d probably see me jumping off the roof of the Cross State Office Building,” joked the department’s elections chief.

If 1B attains a plurality of the votes with a minimum of 33 percent, proponents are not worried about the timing of a future vote since the Baldacci plan represents a phased-in approach to educational funding and tax relief. For proponents of 1A, however, timing is everything.

Much of the language within the 1A legislation is time sensitive, including a provision requiring the Legislature’s Taxation Committee to report out a funding plan for the proposal no later than March 1, 2004. More importantly, the legislation mandates the initiative’s implementation by the Legislature effective July 1, 2004.

Mike Starn, at the MMA, would like to think that if 1A received a strong enough vote on Nov. 4, the Legislature would schedule a vote in February to respect the spirit of the initiative and the deadlines within the question’s legislation. The Maine Constitution states a vote cannot be held sooner than 60 days after Nov. 4 or later than the June primary and leaves the Legislature with the option of scheduling an election anytime between those dates. Since the Legislature gave supermajority votes to 1B, Starn knows lawmakers would not have a burning desire to accommodate any special requests from the MMA.

“I guess it depends on what kind of a plurality we might get,” Starn said. “If it’s 49 percent, I think it could work against the Legislature to delay the vote. Not only in terms of timing for compliance, but also for funding. It might require a legal interpretation.”

Kay Rand, a spokeswoman for 1B, said the MMA would be hard-pressed to justify the need for a court challenge on constitutional grounds. She said timing provisions built into 1A’s legislation also could prove to be its fatal flaw in the event the question only receives a plurality of the vote.

“They will be forced to wait on the Legislature and the Legislature will ignore their requests for a February vote,” she said. “They’ll ignore it until when and if it becomes law. In addition, the Legislature and the governor will argue that it should not pass in June. There would be another campaign at that time to defeat it.”

The prospects for the initiative’s failure in such a scenario loom large, according to Rand. Baldacci will be able to make a valid argument to voters that approval of the question in June would require an emergency session of the Legislature to determine a funding mechanism to identify $264 million with only three weeks remaining before the beginning of the next fiscal year on July 1.

“The governor would be forced to comply with the will of the people with a timetable of less than 30 days – which is why it would be pretty easy to defeat by itself in June,” she said.