For the small price of your dignity, you can send a message, albeit asinine; but a message nonetheless, to the powers-that-be that you support intelligent mass transit solutions in Boise and the Treasure Valley by gathering with friends and family and taking a “2 Buck Tour” sans trousers of Boise+ on Boise’s 1st Annual No Pants Day, Friday May2nd.

For more info, visit: http://www.BOISEnopantsday.com and / or http://www.myspace.com/boisenopantsday

“Avoid the instincts that will drag you down and make you ordinary” ~Ari Voukydis

JIMV:
Yep, sound just like what we’ve got here after umpteen years of Republican rule — soaring taxes, people losing their homes, U grads flee because of low pay jobs …
Now the R’s have decided to finally give state workers a raise — ranging from 0% to 3% (even the top being way below inflation) — and then send the cost of their health insurance soaring, while demolishing their retirement pay system.
The pols do manage to keep creating a few tax breaks for the richest companies, though.

Seems it doesn’t matter which party has the power — they both become thoroughly corrupt when they hold the reins.

Some years back, Idaho used to elect a Republican Legislature and a Democratic governor — they kind of kept each other in check to some extent.

Now the R legislators are busy fighting with the R governor, so neither can seem to get anything done. (Maybe that’s just as well.)

Ah, well — where else can you run to?

“Yep, sound just like what we’ve got here after umpteen years of Republican rule — soaring taxes, people losing their homes, U grads flee because of low pay jobs …”

Having lived in both states, I wake every morning and bless God that I live in Idaho. You have never seen high taxes and the only folk losing their homes here, as about everywhere, are folk who bought into the ‘free lunch’ idea of not needed enough money to pay the mortgage.

I do not know if Idaho uses the concept of ‘tax aquired property’ as Maine does. In Maine, if you owe the city a few thousand in back property taxes or sewer fees, they can and do steal your home, sell it, and keep ALL the proceeds, normally hundreds of thousands in profit.

Another diference is, in Idaho the highest wage earners in the state do not work for the government as they do in Maine. The ‘average’ teacher in Portland maine has a salary of about $60K while the median family income in the city is $38K (and Portland is the most prosperous area of Maine). 108,000 wage earners of 620,000 get a pay check directly from government, an equal number are social workers or contract employees who work in the private sector but whose income comes from the taxpayer. The top Maine income tax rate of 8.75% is reached for single folk at less than $17,000. The state uses the personal property tax to tax private cars every year. When you buy a car, you have to pay both a sales tax and a county tax. the county tax does not reflect the purchase price of the car but the MSRP. You pay the county tax every year.

If you plan to retire in Maine you pay income tax on your retirement income, all of it, except for a $7K deduction on a military pension.

You will note that almost all these taxes are not levied in the same way in Idaho.

Oh, then there is the ‘vernal pool’ restrictions. The legislature decided that ‘significant’ vernal pools on private prperty must be protected for green reasons so…If you own a home of land with serious mud puddles on it, you cannot develop the area around the puddle.

A vernal pool is not a lake or pond where there is there year round but an area of mud puddles that dry up and go away after the winter snows melt.

You want to buy heath insurance in Maine? Seems the legislatrue has regulated the products offered and companies participating to the point that health insurance costs almost twice as much in Maine as in next door New Hampshire…same policy, same company.

Yeah, the left is so good at managing economies…Maine is a third world country masquarading as a US State.

On the topic of knowing how your money is being spent – I beg your attention to the pending misuse of millions of dollars:

Prison growth skyrockets – Idaho is repeat offender

By 2011 one in every 178 U.S. residents will live in prison, according to a recent report by the Public Safety Performance Project of The Pew Charitable Trusts. Public Safety, Public Spending: Forecasting America’s Prison Population 2007-2011 projects that by 2011 America will have more than 1.7 million men and women in prison, an increase of more than 192,000 from 2006. That increase could cost taxpayers as much as $27.5 billion over the next five years beyond what they currently spend on prisons.

HEY COWBOY BUTCH: READ THIS PART CAREFULLY:
“Innovative governors and legislators across the country are exploring policies, programs and technologies they believe will save their states money and reduce recidivism,” said Adam Gelb, poject director of the Public Safety Performance Project.

• Unless Montana, Arizona, Alaska, Idaho and Vermont change their sentencing or release practices, they can expect to see their prison systems grow by one third or more.
• The new inmates will cost states an additional $15 billion for prison operations over the five-year period. Construction of new prison beds will cost as much as $12.5 billion.

“As states continue to struggle with tight budgets and competing priorities among health, education and safety, they are beginning to question whether huge additional investments in prisons are the most effective and economical way of combating crime,” said Susan Urahn, Managing Director of State Policy Initiatives at The Pew Charitable Trusts. “The challenge for state policy makers is to ensure that taxpayers are getting a strong return on their investment in corrections: safer communities, efficient use of public dollars, and ex-offenders who become productive, law-abiding members of society.”
Full report: http://www.pewcenteronthestates.org/news_room_detail.aspx?id=31976

JIMV:
“… the only folk losing their homes here, as about everywhere, are folk who bought into the ‘free lunch’ idea of not needed enough money to pay the mortgage.”
**Not quite right. These are just the latest. Well before that pitfall came to light, many lost their homes as they saw their property tax soar — doubling, even tripling in a year or two.
Mine rose by about 50 percent one year, then another 100 percent the next year (I was lucky, I was able to hang onto it, but it sure made life rough). They “justify” it by saying your property value has increased — well, that doesn’t do you any good unless you sell your home in order to pay the tax on it.

“I do not know if Idaho uses the concept of ‘tax aquired property’ as Maine does. In Maine, if you owe the city a few thousand in back property taxes or sewer fees, they can and do steal your home, sell it, and keep ALL the proceeds, normally hundreds of thousands in profit.”
** Yep, Idaho does that, too. You may owe 10 or 20 thou, so they take the property and sell it for 100 thou or whatever, and keep it all. Nice of them, isn’t it?

And, yes, Idaho taxes all of my retirement pay from my former employer (though not Social Security; feds take a bite out of that).

‘Tain’t all roses here, either, amigo.

“IDAHO
taxation w/o representation”

That is a good one. Does not DC use that slogan? In Maine the slogan on the plates says “Vacationland”. Some wag changed that to “Taxationland” and was arrested by the state police…