Free Flow of Information Act of 2007--Motion to Proceed--Resumed

Floor Speech

FREE FLOW OF INFORMATION ACT OF 2007--MOTION TO PROCEED--Resumed -- (Senate - July 29, 2008)

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

TAX EXTENDERS

Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, in the last year, Americans here at home have faced an ever increasing number of challenges--skyrocketing gas prices, the mortgage and foreclosure crisis, record job losses, and devastating natural disasters. Families are hurting in this country today and they need relief right now.

I have come to the floor this evening because we will soon be voting on legislation that will help ease the burden for many of these families. We know it is not perfect, but the Jobs, Energy, Families and Disaster Relief Act of 2008 will take important steps to create jobs and provide disaster relief to flood, tornado, and hurricane victims. That bill includes critical provisions that will help our renewable energy industry continue to thrive and to shore up our Highway Trust Fund as well. It also includes provisions that are important to my home State of Washington, including a measure to extend the sales tax deduction and help our rural schools.

I come to the floor this evening to take a few minutes to urge my colleagues tomorrow to support this legislation and help get it into the hands of our taxpayers and our communities that so desperately need it. I will begin by explaining how important it is that we extend the sales tax deduction.

In most States, taxpayers can deduct their State income taxes on their Federal tax returns. But people who live in my home State of Washington historically have not had that option. Back in 2004 I worked with my colleagues from my home State of Washington, Senator Cantwell and Congressman Baird, on a measure that temporarily enables taxpayers to take an itemized deduction for State and local sales taxes. That provision enabled nearly 1 million people to save an average of $519 to $575 each and every year. It has helped many of our middle-class families pay for school or cars or other major expenses.

The Washington State Office of Revenue Forecast has told us that the sales tax deduction has actually created thousands of new jobs in our State. But it was a huge blow to the taxpayers in my home State when that sales tax deduction expired in December and then our Republican colleagues decided to block a bill that would have extended it for 2 more years. Tomorrow we will have, finally, another chance. That proposal we will vote on would extend this provision to the end of 2008.

At a time when so many of our families are struggling to get by, at a time when we are looking for innovative ways to stimulate the economy, it is vital that we approve that measure tomorrow and establish fairness in our State tax system and put money back into the pockets of our State taxpayers.

Another provision in this same bill we will be voting on tomorrow is important to help communities in my State and others pay for roads and schools and basic services. In Washington State and in other big Western States where vast areas of land are owned by the Federal Government, States currently lose millions of dollars in tax revenue that normally would go to pay for our schools or our local government services. In the past, the Federal Government shared the revenue from timber sales on our Federal lands to help our States make up for that lost revenue. But because timber sales have been decreasing since the middle of the 1990s, Congress passed an act called the Secure Rural Schools Act, to ensure that our rural communities and counties would continue to get the money they need to pay for their schools and their roads and provide basic services. That act expired 2 years ago now. While we funded it for a year on the fiscal year 2007 supplemental, it has not been extended this year, and that means our rural communities in my home State and across the West are now struggling to keep their school doors open. Some of our counties, in fact, have already been sending out pink slips.

The bill we will vote on tomorrow will again extend that program to 2011 and adjust the funding formula to make it more equitable and increase Payments in Lieu of Taxes to these rural communities and counties across the country. This provision is extremely important to our rural communities. All of our children deserve an equal opportunity to learn, regardless of where they live. That is why the secure rural funding program is so important. I hope our colleagues across the aisle will join us tomorrow to vote for this.

I also want to say a few words about the highway trust fund fix, which is also in the same bill we will be voting on. The condition of the highway trust fund, which helps us pay for all of our highway repair and construction across this country as well as mass transit, has been deteriorating now for years. Skyrocketing gas prices have made an already dire situation worse.

This year we are going to see the largest recorded decrease in highway miles traveled in the last 17 years. As a result of that, the highway trust fund is now less than a year away from going bankrupt. That is going to leave a lot of critical construction projects in every one of our States in peril.

I, along with Senator Bond, who is the ranking member on my Transportation and Housing Appropriations Subcommittee, have been sounding the alarm about the problems facing our highway trust fund for almost 2 years now. In January of 2007 we wrote and voiced our concerns to Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley on the Finance Committee and they promised to help us fix this problem.

The Senate has now tried twice to move a bill through the Senate to fix the highway trust fund for this year, for 2009. There is a broad, bipartisan consensus for solution. But, unfortunately, our efforts have been blocked repeatedly by a few Senators.

This bill we will vote on tomorrow, if it passes, will provide enough money, $8 billion, to get us through this coming fiscal year. That means our construction projects can continue to go forward in every single State and it will help us keep as many as 380,000 good-paying jobs to continue critical construction and repair projects that will make our highways and our bridges safer. That proposal that is in that bill will not have any revenue effect. It passed the House on July 23 by an overwhelming majority and it is vitally important to all of our communities that this Senate do the same thing.

I hope our colleagues join with us tomorrow to invoke cloture and move to this bill, this tax extenders bill, so we can put this provision in place.

That same bill also includes a number of other provisions that will help ease the burden of the faltering economy for our taxpayers. It will extend the tax credits for wind, biomass, geothermal, and other renewable energy providers, and help provide stability for that developing industry.

As I said at the beginning of my remarks, the bill is not perfect. Unfortunately, we have had to leave out some worthy items. But it is an extremely important bill and we are very close to making this legislation a reality. We need a few Senators to vote with us tomorrow morning.

I am worried. I come to the floor to speak tonight because I am concerned that there are some on the other side of the aisle who seem to be willing to play politics, rather than help us bring forward this bill that will create jobs and support clean energy and provide tax relief for our families. I am here tonight to say this is far too important an issue with which to play politics. Not only are all of these provisions critically important but they are time sensitive. They are time sensitive. At a time when our economy is lagging and so many families are struggling, we need to get these programs in place and we need them now.

I hope that tomorrow morning when we vote on the cloture to move to this tax extenders bill that our friends on the other side will join us, that they will put politics aside and hopefully make American families a priority.

I will yield the floor.

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