State needs to be efficient before it can raise more taxes
In his column, “Taking that big first step,” [NWWednesday, April 20], Danny Westneat cites Joe Decuir’s idea of economic patriotism and going first, initiating contribution of more in taxes.
I consider myself patriotic, and I pose this question: How about government going first, by living within its means and proving it is at peak efficiency through adopting performance audits of government agencies?
We could even start with a pilot project right here, at home with our very own state government. Let’s start by implementing all of State Auditor Brian Sonntag’s 602 audit recommendations, since he claims that they will save 10 percent across the board.
Should Sonntag be right, with a $31 billion budget, we could have saved $3.1 billion in the last biennium. That might have kept the Democrat-controlled Legislature out of a special session and lawmakers from raising new taxes, let alone their 20 percent increase in the business and occupation tax on service industry businesses from 1.5 to 1.8 percent.
Smart choices and sacrifice would be truly patriotic. Then once we are at peak efficiency and we still need more revenue, we can talk.
— Justin Kawabori, Redmond