Pass the CARR Bill

Montgomery County faces a $297 million budget deficit. Prince George’s County is projecting a $100 million budget deficit. Baltimore City is seeing a 20-30% drop in recordation receipts and transfer taxes. So there is lots of talk in these jurisdictions and others of raising taxes and fees, freezing hiring and perhaps even delaying compensation increases for employees, all traditional methods of dealing with budget deficits. But new District 18 Delegate Al Carr has a better idea.

Carr points out that state law allows Baltimore City and the counties to set just one property tax rate that applies equally to all categories of real property. So in Baltimore County, for example, the county levies $1.10 per 100 dollars of assessed value regardless of whether the property is a house or a giant office building. Baltimore City’s rate is $2.27, again applied equally to housing or commercial properties. No county government is allowed to establish different rates for different property types.

Over the long run this can cause problems. Take Montgomery County. According to the county’s Department of Finance, residential property (including condominiums) accounted for 69.6% of the county’s total assessed value of real property in 1991. By 2007, that percentage had climbed to 76.8%. On the other hand, commercial property’s percentage of total assessed value fell from 30.4% to 23.2% over the same period of time. The state’s homestead tax credit limits tax increases on owner-occupied homes to 10% per year, but that merely delays tax increases rather than eliminates them. The bottom line is that, at least in Montgomery, the property tax burden has been slowly shifting from commercial owners to residents.

Maryland’s municipal governments, unlike the counties, are free to set different rates on different classes of property. The District of Columbia charges 85 cents per 100 assessed dollars for residential property and $1.85 per 100 assessed dollars for commercial property. A new Virginia law allows counties and cities in Northern Virginia to establish different property tax rates and Arlington County is considering doing so. Carr’s bill, HB 676 – cosponsored by Delegates Barkley, Bobo, Feldman, Gilchrist, Hucker, Kaiser, Lafferty, Manno, McIntosh, Montgomery, Tarrant, Taylor and Waldstreicher – would give Maryland’s counties and Baltimore City the same ability to establish different property tax rates that these other jurisdictions have. (District 18 Senator Rich Madaleno is sponsoring the companion bill in the Senate.) Hereinafter, this bill shall be designated the Commercial Assessment Rate Review (CARR) bill by the authority vested in me as the author of this blog post!

Won’t raising commercial property tax rates cause real estate and job losses? Not necessarily. Consider the District, which charges a commercial property tax rate more than double the residential rate. Commercial property manager Transwestern estimates the District’s office vacancy rate at 5.8%, one of the lowest rates in the country. Transwestern proclaims, “The District remains one of the top-performing areas in the nation with a strong tenant base, low vacancy rate and high barriers to entry.” Sounds like that higher commercial rate is really killing their economy.

And the CARR bill would even enable counties to lower commercial property tax rates below residential rates. Consider a county seeking to revitalize a run-down commercial center. Right now it could not do it through cutting the commercial property tax rate. With the CARR bill, it could.

The point is that this bill gives county governments new options for changing their revenue mix in good times and bad. And at this moment, Montgomery, Prince George’s, Baltimore and other jurisdictions need those options. Otherwise residential taxpayers and public employees could pay the price. So what are you waiting for guys? Pass the CARR bill!

Heavy Metal Makeup

If you’re a knuckle-dragging Cro-Magnon like me, you’ve probably waited impatiently for your wife or girlfriend to finish getting ready before you both head out to dinner. You’ve growled at the bathroom door, thinking, “What on Earth is she doing in there? What’s taking so long?”

Well, Mr. Caveman, she’s going through her checklist. Foundation and powder, check. Mascara, check. Eye shadow, check. Lipstick, check. Mercury, check.

Waitaminnit – MERCURY?! That’s right, MERCURY.

Mercury is sometimes used as a preservative and germ-killer in a wide range of cosmetics, including soap, mascara, eye-liner and creams. It is the active ingredient in some foreign-made skin-whitening creams. Back in 1995 and 1996, skin creams containing mercury were found to have poisoned three people in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. In 2002, women in Hong Kong panicked after a skin-whitening cream was found to contain 9,000-65,000 times the maximum allowed mercury dosage. A 2005 study by the Mercury Policy Project found that mercury frequently appeared in cosmetics used in Africa, and a quarter to a third of women used those cosmetics in several countries. Shockingly, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration actually allows mercury in eye-area cosmetics so long as its levels do not exceed 65 parts per million.

Last month, Minnesota became the first state in the U.S. to ban all cosmetic products containing mercury. And Maryland could follow suit. New District 18 Delegate Al Carr has introduced House Bill 587 (co-sponsored by Delegates Braveboy, Gutierrez, Howard, Hucker, Krysiak, Kullen, Lee, Manno, Mizeur, Montgomery, Stukes and Waldstreicher), which would ban the sale, offer for sale or distribution of all cosmetic products containing any mercury in the state.

Come on you guys, is it really worth it? If we can’t eat it, can’t drink it, can’t inhale it, can’t use it in our thermometers, then is it OK to spread it all over our bodies? This bill is a total no-brainer and it has to pass on the first go.

But if it doesn’t, at least all that mercury should cut down on those pesky botox fees.

(We would like to thank District 18 Breakfast Goddess Susan Heltemes for sharing this with us. Susan doesn’t need mercury to look her best at our breakfasts!)

Who’s Got the Biggest War Chests in MoCo?

If you have not done this already, go visit the UMBC Maryland Campaign Finance website. It’s a fun research tool and you’ll learn things about politicians you won’t believe. For example: who’s got money and who’s broke?

We here at MPW are, as always, dedicated to our growing legions of devoted readers. As usual, WE will do the work so that YOU – the informed political consumers who know enough to visit us every day – can draw your own conclusions. So, let’s go to the data!

Broadly speaking, candidate finances are reported in five categories: receipts, expenditures, cash/account balance, in-kinds and outstanding obligations. Think of the difference between account balance and outstanding obligations as a political balance sheet. High balances with no obligations can be liquidated as political ammo immediately. Outstanding obligations are almost always loans that candidates make to themselves. With every dollar they spend, candidates with high outstanding obligations are deciding whether to keep running for office or replenish their depleted nest eggs. These being politicians, most will decide to buy that extra campaign sign.

The last financial reports came in as of 1/17/07. The next batch should be in around Valentine’s Day – fitting, don’t you think? Of course, a lot has happened over the last year but fret not – we will update you.

So which MoCo state legislators have the most money? Measured by campaign account balance, the three best-financed MoCo Senators were Jennie Forehand (D17 - $64,092), Brian Frosh (D16 - $41,667) and Rob Garagiola (D15 - $31,024). The three poorest MoCo Senators were Jamie Raskin (D20 - $4,821), Mike Lenett (D19 - $7,518) and Nancy King (D39 - $8,875). To be fair to King, she was only recently appointed to the Senate.

Among the MoCo Delegates, the three best-financed were Susan Lee (D16 - $66,027), Heather Mizeur (D20 - $38,869) and Jeff Waldstreicher (D18 - $32,158). The three poorest were Al Carr (D18 - $280), Brian Feldman (D15 - $338) and Saqib Ali (D39 - $391). To be fair to Carr, he was not a Delegate at the time of his last report.

It’s not just about account balance though. Remember those pesky outstanding obligations? Sometimes they’re not merely pesky – they’re absolutely colossal. I know it’s shocking, but some politicians will spend lots of their own money to win. The only three MoCo Senators who reported outstanding obligations were Mike Lenett (D19 - $160,000), Jamie Raskin (D20 - $20,000) and Rob Garagiola (D15 - $10,000). All had contested races and all of these obligations were loans to their own campaigns.

The Delegates who reported the largest outstanding obligations were Ben Kramer (D19 - $114,450), Roger Manno (D19 - $70,000) and Jeff Waldstreicher (D18 - $42,417). Again, all had seriously contested races and all of their obligations were loans to themselves. So dear reader, if you had to put in $100,000 of your own money to just have a shot at winning office, would you do it?

Now here’s the interesting part. Subtract outstanding obligations from account balances and which incumbents were the most solvent? Among MoCo Senators, the leaders were Jennie Forehand (D17 - $64,092), Brian Frosh (D16 - $41,667) and Rob Garagiola (D15 - $21,024). No surprises there. But two Senators actually had negative net assets – Mike Lenett (D19 – negative $152,482) and Jamie Raskin (D20 – negative $15,179).

Among the delegates, the leaders in net assets were Susan Lee (D16 - $66,027), Heather Mizeur (D20 - $38,869) and House Majority Leader Kumar Barve (D17 - $30,843). The worst off were Ben Kramer (D19 – negative $113,252), Roger Manno (D19 – negative $67,611) and Al Carr (D18 – negative $19,370). Seeing as how Kramer and Manno serve in the same district, they would be wise to run together on a slate to avoid bankrupting each other.

One note of caution. Many of these candidates have joint slate accounts that pay for multi-candidate signs and mailings. Those who stick together on slates and collect the Apple Ballot need less money to win (and almost always do win). So monetary weakness does not always equal political weakness.

What about potential Delegate challengers? Jean Cryor (D15), Joan Stern (D39), Aaron Klein (D20), appointment candidate Hugh Bailey (D39) and Ryan Spiegel (D17) all finished with positive account balances, though Bailey and Spiegel had very little money left. Regina Oldak (D16), Paul Griffin (D19), Alec Stone (D19) and Dana Beyer (D18) all finished with five-digit outstanding loans to themselves. Beyer’s outstanding loan total – $75,000 – was only exceeded by Lenett and Kramer. These four candidates will probably have to choose between running for office again or making a down payment on that Eastern Shore beach cabin we all want. Crab-loving hedonist that I am, I’d take the beach cabin.