The art of bumbling into lucrative new sources of tax revenue has never been an uncommon talent in Augusta. Some years ago, a weeping Maine Legislature enacted a snack tax, a levy reluctantly targeted on food junkies hooked on all things fattening whether wrapped in cellophane or not. Maine legislators, describing themselves to their constituents as “grief-stricken” by the totally unwanted success of the tax, had been hoping all along that it would generate hordes of dieters, not lots of money.

So, too, with the current hourly increases in Maine’s cigarette tax, more familiarly known as the Father of the New Hampshire Road Trip. At each legislative session, members fall to their knees and pray in solemn unison that each hike they approve will turn smokers away from their unhealthy habit and toward less-sinful taxable items such as chewing gum or medicated, slow-release adhesive patches. The clear goal of the Legislature is someday to eliminate entirely all revenue from this do-good tax.

Another levy rooted in altruism, this one a tax on werewolf sightings, is currently in committee in Augusta. Never mind that werewolves left Maine in a snit for Romania about 90 years ago and swore never to return. Last year, just under 185,000 Mainers, not one of them legally sober, reported having seen a werewolf. The Maine Legislature, fed up with the excessive costs of investigating each incident, appears poised to impose a $4.50 tax on anyone claiming to have seen a werewolf. Members hope that, in time, this tax will bring an end to hangovers in the unorganized territories.

Maybe so, and maybe not. But altruistic planned obsolescence, even when foiled by unwanted dumb luck, is no foundation on which to build a relentlessly profitable inventory of taxpayer pocket-pickings in Augusta. The Maine Legislature clearly needs outside professional help in finding lucrative, long-lasting, sure-thing sources of tax revenues for the state.

Many Mainers may think that there is little left to tax. Not so. My firm, TaxME, an offshore corporation founded three days ago on Matinicus but relocated to Islesboro yesterday under lobster-boat escort, can pinpoint several areas in which tax opportunities still exist. All we ask in return is a modest cut of the proceeds which our tax ideas, when enacted into law, cough up to the coffers in the Capitol City. Briefly described below are just three examples of the sorts of Maine revenue notions TaxME can dream up daily. Note that each example comes completely untainted by please-fail altruism.

How about a surtax on sprout-bearing fingerling potatoes longer than the legal limit? Maine potato farmers, although required to do so by existing state law, almost never throw back into the field sprouted fingerlings exceeding 2 inches in length. Rather than continuing naively to think that farmers will someday comply with the law, the Maine Legislature should repeal it and substitute the surtax suggested.

There should be a recreational tax on people and organizations providing a place for underage youngsters to bob for apples. This activity draws excessive amounts of water from the Maine aquifer, a precious natural resource already being plundered with near impunity by bottled-water bandits from away, far away. It is time for a tax crackdown in this category, and apple-bobbing is as good a place to start as any.

The Maine sales tax statutes should be amended to include the proceeds from children’s roadside lemonade stands. Young people who hawk lemonade on especially hot summer days currently do so without collecting any tax on their sales. This practice is tacitly condoned by their parents, who should be ashamed of themselves for contributing to the tax delinquency of a minor when, instead, they could be easing their offspring into the practical study of decimal points in multiplication.

The foregoing three examples of taxes-in-waiting represent only a small portion of those currently in the files at TaxME. The Maine Legislature, should it elect to hire us, can also expect an added advantage. When the tax proceeds come rolling in, we will also make available the services of our wholly-owned subsidiary: SpendME.

Charles Packard teaches Latin and writing at Watershed Community School in Rockland.