How Taxes Work

We Saw That said, in comments:

sorry have to disagree with you. sheriff hilton is a scam artist. the tax you mentioned is "in perpetuity" that means that these children (not even born yet) that you claim are so precious to this scam artist will have have to pay this tax with no say about it. thats unamerican. its taxation without representation.

No need to be sorry about disagreeing with me. Lots of people disagree with me. That is what makes America great.

However, I have to remind you that we still live in a democracy, where votes count. The tax we're talking about is a local tax, a half-cent sales tax that was voted on by the people. The tax does not need to be renewed, but nothing is perpetual. Perpetuity is a long, long time and things change, over time.

Let me tell you how it works, locally at least. There exists in the Louisiana tax code a mechanism for levying and repealing taxes. I'm too lazy to look it up, but basically, if you get enough folks to agree that we don't need a tax, the mechanism exists to repeal that tax.

In Rapides Parish, if you can get 20,000 people to agree that we don't need the tax, then the tax will be repealed. That's all it takes! 20,000 people. If you get that many to agree with you, you can get just about anything repealed or imposed here in Rapides Parish. Depending on the election that the repeal intitiative is placed on, you might get it done with 16,000 people, but 20K will give you a good margin.

Why 20,000 you ask? Simple. A lot of people won't go vote in an election, for a variety of reasons. Either they aren't registered, or they're too young, or they're too apathetic, or they think their vote doesn't matter. 20,000 votes will settle a lot of issues in Rapides Parish.

And for the record, I've known William Hilton for a long time. In my opinion, on the short list of very good people in this world, William Earl Hilton on that list. He is a good man. He is a good sheriff. In this opinion, like all others, you are certainly free to disagree with me.

Thanks for your comment.