There is no question that millions of our state tax dollars are being improperly spent. As a state employee, I saw waste, inefficiency and misspent public monies. Under Governor LePage, approximately ninety percent of my time for five years was spent doing nothing because he did not want to enforce environmental laws. In my case alone, hundreds of thousands of public monies were wasted because the governor didn’t want me to do my job, not because there wasn’t much work to be done. I was proud of my state service and what I had accomplished pre-Lepage and did not want to leave. In addition, I was not able to leave state service because of LePage’s age 62 mandate and because I simply could not afford to. I was not alone. Those members of the public who believed that LePage did a good job as governor could not have been more wrong.
I support maximizing government efficiency and effectiveness. I support a progressive tax structure in which those with higher incomes pay more in taxes and those with lower incomes pay less in taxes. I support identifying and eliminating tax loopholes and tax exemptions for the wealthy and the favored special interests.
The gap between rich and poor is widening. This is undermining the very foundation of our country. We all must pay our fair share. Tax loopholes for the wealthy are simply not fair. A progressive tax structure is a necessary way of bridging this gap in order to help to restore faith and confidence in our government.
