Legislative inaction on property tax reform

Dallasblog.com | Tom Pauken:

“I am not sure that our elected officials in Austin and Washington are aware of the growing disconnect between the people who pay the taxes and those who run our government. Isn't it time we got back to representing the 'forgotten Americans', the middle class taxpayers and homeowners who don't have lobbyists down in Austin or up in Washington, but just want to be treated fairly and who are tired of being ignored by our elected officials. I think the time has come for a grassroots, property tax revolt here in Texas. Count me in for the battle.”

Ed Cognoski responds:

Tom Pauken presents a laundry list of measures that his so-called Task Force on Appraisal Reform recommended to the Texas legislature, recommendations that the legislature has failed to act on. He forgets one of his recommendations, sales price disclosure, because getting accurate appraisals was never the goal, despite the task force name. Cutting taxes was the goal. (Cutting property taxes anyway; he doesn't mind if regressive sales taxes go up.) Handicapping local government was the means to achieve his goal.

Tom Pauken talks of "the growing disconnect between the people who pay the taxes and those who run our government." If this is indeed a problem, there is a simple solution - it's called elections. If Tom Pauken doesn't like the representatives that the voters choose to represent them, let him try to convince voters to elect him instead. Texans don't need unelected task forces run by unelected bureaucrats like Tom Pauken dictating how to run our cities and school boards.