New Shale Caucus

A new bi-partisan caucus has formed in the Arkansas Legislature. The Fayetteville Shale Caucus is made up of 16 legislators (there are others joining) that want to protect the economic well-being of the Fayetteville shale from potentially damaging legislation.

The Arkansas Democrat Gazette reported today that "there have been 27 bills filed that would affect natural gas drilling in the state, many of them by Rep. Kathy Webb of Little Rock."

The article also printed this statement issued from the Caucus:

“We all have issues that our constituents want addressed. Sometimes, however, people file bills with good intent that effect the lives and jobs of people not in their district. It’s become pretty clear the Fayetteville Shale Play has become a target for a lot of recent legislation. The Fayetteville Shale is an economic engine that we must protect. Our goal is to protect the economic impact of the affected counties while working with the industry folks to encourage good corporate citizenship. We think we can do that without a ton of legislation. Hopefully, the people will appreciate the bi-partisan cooperation and the unity between members of different chambers.

We, and many of our colleagues, agree that we need to send the right message to the business community that we appreciate their business and can find ways to work pro-actively through issues. The Fayetteville Shale Play is important to the long-term economic future of our districts and also the State ofArkansas. We are confident this will be a constructive working group that will strengthen the relationship between this important industry and the people of Arkansas.”

 TalkBusiness had this to say about the new Shale Caucus:

The Shale Caucus could face their first test tomorrow morning in House Insurance and Commerce. HB 1992, which would eliminate a severance tax reduction for "high-cost" wells, is expected to be considered. The bill could threaten drilling activity in the region, in part due to the low price of natural gas in the commodities markets. More details on that bill and an interview with Southwestern Energy executive Mark Boling, who discusses the economics of drilling as well as some interesting comments on the mystery of earthquake activity in Arkansas, at this link

Members of the Caucus include: 

State Representative Mark Biviano (R-Searcy)

State Representative Robert Dale (R-Dover)

State Representative Jane English (R-North Little Rock)

State Representative Jeremy Gillam (R-Judsonia)

State Representative Andrea Lea (R-Russellville)

State Representative Josh Johnston (R-Rose Bud)

State Representative Stephen Meeks (R-Greenbrier)

State Representative David Meeks (R-Conway)

State Representative David Sanders (R-Little Rock)

State Representative Tommy Thompson (D-Morrilton)

State Representative Linda Tyler (D-Conway)

State Senator Gilbert Baker (R-Conway)

State Senator Jonathan Dismang (R-Beebe)

State Senator Michael Lamoureux (R-Russellville)

State Senator Jason Rapert (R-Bigelow)

State Senator David Wyatt (D-Batesville)

Locomotive Speeds Through Arkansas Capitol

WOW! Did anyone else out here notice that locomotive that roared full-bore through the Senate Public Health Committee  today, as SB709 was set for a visit?

As the engineer (Chairman), Senator Percy Malone, grabbed for the whistle to get the train movin,’ people filed in like slabs of beef in a refrigerator car until there wasn’t an inch of space to spare.

It was quite evident from the strike of the gavel that Chairman Malone was going to ensure a fair and balanced debate this morning…NOT (This means I’m kidding).

The meeting hadn’t gotten a full head of steam when Malone suggested time limits for each side. If he’d had it his way, it was evident to me the committee would’ve passed this stop all together. The meeting began at 10 a.m. and was over just shy of 11, with more than a dozen folks slated to speak. So much for open and reasonable debate in conducting the people’s bidness.

I’ll not belabor the blow-by-blow. However two people I spoke with after the meeting, who had traveled from out of state just to testify for this particular bill, were shocked at the way things went.

Christie Herrera, Director Health and Human Services Task Force at the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), and John Nothdurft, Director of Government Relations for the Heartland Institute both travel extensively to testify before legislative bodies all over the country. They shared with me that, in their experience, neither had felt so “railroaded” before. They each recognized quickly that the committee meeting was nothing more than a formality to a predestined end, regardless of what expertise they each brought to the table. In other words, my friends, the thing had been all planned out beforehand.

It was no surprise that the Attorney General’s office showed to testify against the bill, as did a few other government agencies, to which one observer said and was later tweeted by @AFPArkansas: “What happened today was as follows: the gov’t lobbying the gov't for more gov't.” No truer synopsis of the day.

The end of the tracks for SB709 was a split vote 4-4 straight down party lines.

The bug slinger here was Senator David Burnett (D-Osceola) who,  up until today’s steamrolling, was considered relatively conservative. He ran last November unopposed, I somehow doubt that happens again.

I’m sure the fact that this is Governor Beebe’s pet project had nothing to do with the speed at which engineer Malone ran his locomotive through today’s session. But as with all speeding trains at some point there is a stop. And it can be ugly to watch.

That’s when passengers that have been riding along for long time without feeling appreciated or respected can become quite disgruntled. That usually means they search for find a new carrier who will listen to them and give a whistle about meeting their needs and concerns.

My hope and prayer is that this happens well before this high velocity engine jumps the tracks, leaving untold numbers of Arkansans among the carnage and wreckage. 

As a side note here is a statement released today on this issue from our Lt. Governor Mark Darr:

"I appreciate Senator Missy Irvin’s efforts today to help bring to light the cost of implementing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).  Senate Bill 709, would have provided to the legislature as well as Arkansans the total cost of this act to our state, how many individuals will directly be affected and the consequences of not implementing it. As a candidate I traveled the state talking about the importance of government transparency and spoke openly against government mandated healthcare. Senator Irvin’s bill would have simply provided the accountability and transparency citizens demand from our Government. We all have the right to better understand how PPACA is going to affect each and every one of us. I applaud the four Senators who voted for this bill in committee as well as the many citizens who lined the hallways, placed calls and emails in support of this bill.”

Other articles you may want to read on the issue:

http://tolbertreport.com/2011/03/09/sen-irvins-senate-committee-showdown/

http://talkbusiness.net/article/ALL-EYES-TURN-TO-FEDERAL-HEALTH-CARE-AGAIN-UPDATED-/1600/

http://www.curtiscolemaninstitute.com/blog1/?p=1585

Arkansas Flagship For Obamacare~

There are tons of questions and assertions flying around about the latest brouhaha at the Little Rock Capitol~ Obama Care coming to Little Rock.

Evidently Governor Mike Beebe has decided to present his own form of healthcare reform. It is no secret that Gov. Beebe has had visions of Medicaid dollars dancing in his head. One should be careful what they wish for~he has found himself under the thumb of Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius and, thus, President Obama.

"In conjunction with Medicare, Arkansas Blue Cross and BlueShield, and private insurance plans, Arkansas Medicaid will design and then implement the nation's first statewide payment-reform initiative. The initiative will pay partnerships of local providers to act as health homes." This is an excerpt from a letter released from the Governor's office. (Full Doc here)

Today will be the first in likely many battle that Arkansans will face in the future to win the war of Capitalism vs. Socialsim in the world of healthcare. Sen. Missy Irvin will be presenting SB709 - "An Act to Create the Healthcare Reform Accountability Act." You may also like to read that bill by clicking here. This is a major step toward real transparency and accountability of healthcare in Arkansas.

More articles on the matter

GOVERNOR'S MEDICAID REFORM ENCOUNTERING APPREHENSION 

Aarkansas Gov. Beebe Seeks To Be First State To Implement ObamaCare

Ready or Not Here They Come

This was made in a hurry so please excuse any typos, on the road and trying to keep up~




Yesterday was the last day for legislators to file bills and nearly 500 bills were filed leaving the total at close to 2400 for the session. 


I saw a great point made on twitter yesterday~ 
"Are we under-governed, or were previous #arleg's so inept that we need 300 bills filed in one day?" This was made at 3pm, so as you can see they used every last minute.




On the Healthcare Front


Stay tuned today for major news on Arkansas Healthcare- Check my facebook -Laurie Lee Masterson or follow on Twitter @LaurieMasterson #ARLeg
 
Senator Missy Irvin has authored a SB709 that concerns Federal Mandates on the Obama Healthcare bill. This bill would make it mandatory for the Feds to disclose how your money is being spent, where it is being spent and where the monies came from. This bill will be heard on Wednesday- You need to be there


Senator Dismang filed SB593 is on the Senate Public Health Committee agenda could be heard today. This would allow an employer you could benefit from modifying the rules for unemployment insurance. 








Legislative Odds and Ends from Talk Business:

Monday was one of the busiest days of the 88th Arkansas General Assembly as 304 House bills were filed and 192 Senate bills met the deadline. In total, there are 2,234 bills being debated this session and that doesn't include any resolutions, which do eat up committee and floor time.

Today, the Governor's prison bill cleared a Senate Judiciary Committee with ease. As indicated in a previous post, this bill may be signed into law by next week. FYI, Kelly MacNeil with our content partner, KUAR-FM 89 News, highlights a prisoner who could have been helped at some point if the changes under consideration were enacted. (read more...)

News on Unemployment  If you didn't know Arkansas' unemployment trust fund drowning in debt, we have borrowed as much as $400 million in the short term and our unemployment woes are not going away any time soon. Senator Dismang and Representative Carter have filed bills restructure unemployment benefits for Arkansans (HB1728 and SB593). According to the Rogers Chamber, "it is widely anticipated that the federal government will increase the federal wage base on employers. Therefore, passage of state legislation would be the first step in reducing outflows from the fund. The legislation removes indexing of benefits, restricts qualifications, and slightly reduces the length of benefits paid by the state. Current projections estimate that employers will have to pay $21 per employee more in 2012 and $42 more in 2013 to repay the debt to the federal government. This outlay might be reduced with passage of these two bills.

Letting Capital Prompt Gains~ Capital Gains Tax Cut~

Let’s kick this off with explaining what a capital gain even is in the world of taxation. It was brought to my attention the other day that many people don't have a clue what the term means. It does have one of those foggy, generalized sounds that conjures not a single image.
   

A capital gain is simply what the tax law calls the profit you receive when you sell a capital asset, which is property such as stocks, bonds, mutual fund shares and a business that constitutes real estate. This doesn’t include your primary residence by the way.

There already is a federal capital gains tax, which means that even without an additional state version, you will pay at least 10% (and as much as 36%) on a short-term capital gain (less than a year) regardless of your home state. 

But if you’re a business owner or someone who owns real estate, or has invested his money and lives in the state of Arkansas , you’ll also be forking over another average of 4.9 percent on the sale. 
    

I should point out again at this point that Arkansas is one of the nation's least business friendly states, coming it at 39th. We are the 14th highest in state and local tax burden at 9.8%   and Arkansans make $13,000 less than the national average median income. 

Our neighbor states (see map above) are kicking our Razorback hindquarters , and Texas, our arch sports rival is growing in business because they have figured out how to attract, rather than repel new businesses that spell additional new jobs. Those Longhorn folks, along with other neighboring Southern states, realize that eliminating their capital gains taxes is just good for business growth.

According to the Tax Foundation's Background Paper: 2011 State Business Tax Climate Index 

A far more effective approach is to systematically improve the business tax climate for the long term so as to improve the state's competitiveness. When assessing which changes to make, lawmakers need to remember these two rules:

• Taxes matter to business. Business taxes affect business decisions, job creation and retention, plant location, competitiveness, the transparency of the tax system, and the long-term health of a state's economy. Most importantly, taxes diminish profits. If taxes take a larger portion of profits, that cost is passed along to either consumers (through higher prices), workers (through lower wages or fewer jobs), or shareholders (through lower dividends or share value). Thus a state with lower tax costs will be more attractive to business investment, and more likely to experience economic growth. 

• States do not enact tax changes (increases or cuts) in a vacuum. Every tax law will in some way change a state's competitive position relative to its immediate neighbors, its geographic region, and even globally. Ultimately it will affect the state's national standing as a place to live and to do business. Entrepreneurial states can take advantage of the tax increases of their neighbors to lure businesses out of high-tax states.

Columnist Mike Masterson, (full disclosure) my husband, described in his column yesterday this very scenario: 

[A] reader told me that in 1991 an Arkansas banker he knew prepared to sell his bank holding company to another in-state, start-up bank holding business. Before the transaction occurred, the seller moved to a neighboring state that had no a capital gains tax on a business sale. This meant that he legally avoided paying capital gains and income taxes.
Six years later, the same holding company was bought out by another in-state bank that was, in turn, was bought by another, all in fairly short order.
“Those were stock exchange and tax-free gains until a shareholder sold his shares in the open market,” the reader wrote. “As a director and shareholder of the original purchasing bank, I bought as much stock in the bank as I could.”
When the time came for him to sell and pay capital gains, he’d already left Arkansas and saved a hefty chunk by avoiding capital gains taxes on the sale. He still holds a fair amount of stock in another bank after selling half of it while living in his new home state. Once again, he paid nocapital gains taxes because he didn’t have to.
Another of his friends in Arkansas owned a professional firm that he wound up selling. He also bought a home and moved to another state without any capital gains tax before the sale was complete. Cha-ching!
“Arkansas has lost quite a bit in sales and ordinary income taxes from just from us,” the reader. “Arkansas definitely needs to have this bill passed.”
Any questions so far? I hope the need for HB 1002 is becoming much clearer for our oddly resistant governor and any legislators who, inexplicably, oppose the measure, which could help attract businesses and jobs to our state.
Successful politicians find it best to vote for improving Arkansas and its people rather than engaging in or knuckling under to self-serving oleboy politics.
“I’m confident that the other Arkansas businessman and I made our moves to preserve those moneys forour heirs and our select charities,” said this reader, who’s approaching his 70th birthday. “No one did it for personal lavishness. We didn’t want or need to do that. There are a great many like us whose other taxes and contributions Arkansas has missed out on because of its current tax structure.
“I want to be sure to leave my family enough to live on and enough to cover almost any adverse health events,” he continued. “My state now has no income, capital gains tax, estate or death taxes. Were Arkansas close to that, I’d live in the River Valley until I die. As is, I live here.” Ole-boy politics.

 This is an important bill for Arkansas families and attracting Arkansas businesses. Get the facts and contact the Senate Revenue and Tax committee members,  ask them to grow jobs NOT government~  

Senators Lamoureux, Files, Sample and Williams have already committed to a YES vote.

Please contact Senators Teague, Taylor, Chesterfield and Bookout 

 

The Cartel~

It is no secret that America's public education system is in deep kimchi and that billions and billions of dollars are being thrown at that problem every year.

Last night Americans For Prosperity Foundation sponsored a viewing of the movie The Cartel to a packed house in Springdale. The movie "shows us our educational system like we've never seen it before." 

We were privileged to also have Dr. Patrick Wolf , Professor and 21st Century Endowed Chair in School Choice from the University of Arkansas attend and share with us some of the information he has spent years compiling with regards to school choice.

Dr. Wolf shared these facts:

• Since 1970, real spending on public education in the U.S. has more than doubled, yet student test scores on the NAEP over that same period have not improved

• The U.S. spends the most per-pupil on public schooling among all of the countries of the world, yet we recently ranked only tied for 12th in reading, 17th in science, and a miserable 25th in math among 34 developed countries

• Currently we spend an average of over $10,000 per public-school pupil across the U.S. and $9,112 in our otherwise low-cost state of Arkansas, yet only 7 of 10 students in our country and our state even graduate from high school

• Over half of the freshmen who enroll at our state's flagship public university require remediation before taking serious college courses

• Public charter schools receive an average of 40% less public funding than TPS but produce results that are as good or better

• Private schools participating in school voucher programs receive an average of 50% less public funding than TPS and, like public charter schools, produce results that are as good and often better

This begs the question why does our public school system spend so much money to achieve such disappointing results?

Dr. Wolf says one possible explanation examined in this award-winning film is the cartel behavior of the national teachers unions

He added, "Although many public school teachers are dedicated to working hard to educate our children, the teachers unions that represent them are all too often the force that says "no" regarding such common-sense reforms such as performance pay, firing incompetent teachers, expanded learning days, and parental school choice."

We will be hosting viewings around the state over the next several months please visit http://www.americansforprosperity.org/arkansas to keep track of where we are.

Our next showing will be in Nashville, AR Tuesday March 8th~ go here for details 

Bills You Just Won't Believe- It Ain't Pretty

For the love of everything good and holy! 
Do you have any idea some of the poppycock that is being filed on your time and money at our Capitol?


If I hadn't read it for myself I can say I surely would not~ 

Rep.Gary Smith's (D-Camden) has filed  HB1625  which completely prohibits Pee Wee sports practice if temp or heat index is over 85 degrees.  Doesn't that cut out about 7 months here in Arkansas.




And then there is the Hamburger Bill (SB408) filed by Senator Percy Malone (D-Arkadelphia) states that a restaurant that sells hamburger meat that has not been heated to at least 155° F for at least fifteen seconds place a disclaimer on their menu. There are more like these and even more absurd if you can imagine. 


I heard Rep Terry Rice (R- Waldron) say the other day something to the affect that if we keep passing these kinds of bills he is going to just go lay in his bed and hope that an airplane does not crash into in home and kill him. LOL.. I have to agree. Are we going to regulate or ban everything that someone has been injured or killed from. Drinking water, eating grapes, BREATHING~ 


How in the world do legislators plan on implementing and enforcing these laws? Want to know the repercussions of the sports law~ "If a coach violates this section, the parent of a child who is a member of the team is entitled to a full refund of all fees and costs associated with the registration of the child for the pee-wee athletic organization for that season." WHAT? Well that oughta stop it!

And the Hamburger law? There is no penalty described in the bill... ARGGGG 

This is a waste of tax payer time and money. There are now over 1541 bills that have been filed and more are streaming in everyday. These are laws and regulations that make decisions for your family and mine. Where we live, if we can open a business, food we can eat, for heaven sakes when our kids can practice sports!

It will take you and I both calling and being involved to get this type stuff stopped~ GET INFORMED AND ENGAGED~