By Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries of The Somerville News belong solely to the authors of those commentaries and do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville News, its staff or publishers.)

Question 3, proposing to reduce the state sales tax to three percent, on the Nov. 2 ballot is the latest attempt to gut local and state government. Obviously the temptation is to pay less taxes, but this is just a different version of the state income tax rollback that was rejected by 70 percent of state voters (and by every city and town in Massachusetts) on the 2008 ballot. In fact, it’s the same people who were behind the failed income tax rollback who are behind the sales tax rollback proposal in 2010.

All of the same things are at stake this time around. If we cut the sales tax to three percent it will cost the state $2.5 billion. That’s going hit us all right where we live. The vacuum created by the sudden removal of $2.5 billion will be felt in every city and town in Massachusetts. It’s going to mean fewer teachers for our children, fewer police to protect our streets, fewer firefighters to protect our lives and property, fewer workers to maintain our public infrastructure, drastic cuts in library hours, and major cuts to senior programs.

I recently debated Question 3 proponent Kamal Jain on this issue and he asked why programs like these are where the cuts will land. The answer is pretty simple. The cuts will land there because the government runs schools, police departments, fire departments, departments of public works, libraries and senior centers. Everything we do is community focused. When you rip $2.5 billion out of the state budget it means huge cuts in local aid, and huge cuts in local aid means we make deep cuts in the services on which our communities depend. Less money means fewer services.

Somerville already gets $15.2 million less in state aid than it received in 2002. Even with the current tax rates, we expect more cuts to come next year, or possibly during our current fiscal year. The estimate is Somerville will receive another $5 million in cuts on top of that if Question 3 passes. Pair that with the explosive rise in the cost of healthcare – the City’s healthcare costs have more than tripled since 2001 – and Somerville will have to make a choice between wholesale layoffs or a Proposition 2 ½ override.

Please note the word “layoffs” in that previous sentence. Proponents of Question 3 are ideologues who try to pretend there will be no consequences to the actions they would have us take. For instance, they insist that tax cuts will create jobs. Nevermind that federal tax cuts from the Bush administration failed to create jobs. Nevermind that their jobs estimates involve no serious analysis and might as well be random numbers they scratched on the back of a napkin. They’ve got a pet philosophy and they’re sticking to it.

The reality is that tens of thousands of people who currently provide you and the rest of the people in this state with essential services will lose their jobs if Question 3 passes. And it is entirely possible that most of those people will not find equivalent employment elsewhere. The supposed benefits of the sales tax cuts are based on shaky assumptions of a political philosophy that has failed us in the recent past. The only definite thing the sales tax cut would give is a massive number of people immediately losing their jobs.

The negative impact it would have on this state is truly frightening to imagine. That is why I urge you to vote no on Question 3 on Election Day. Two years ago, 77 percent of the voters in this city rejected the proposal to slash the income tax. Question 3 is the same issue, just looking to slash another source of revenue needed for the services on which we all depend.