If Ballot Measure 86 passes, Oregon taxpayers will be more likely to receive tax refunds from the state’s “kicker” law.
Under the current “kicker” law, any state revenue that exceeds state estimates by more than 2 percent at the end of each two-year period must be returned to businesses and individual income taxpayers. However, the state Legislature can withhold the extra funds for state programs and budget balancing with a three-fifths majority vote.
This year, the Legislative Revenue Office estimates the kicker to constitute $282 million for personal taxpayers and $34 million for corporations.
Measure 86 would elevate the kicker law from a statute to a constitutional amendment, meaning that a vote of the people would be required to repeal it rather than just a majority vote in the legislature.
It would also make it more difficult for the government to withhold the kicker for state programs like education, requiring a two-thirds vote in the Legislature instead of three-fifths.
The kicker has been returned in full to taxpayers every year since 1993, but has been partially used to fund state programs in the past. Some officials, including David Piercy, deputy superintendent for the Eugene 4J School District, are concerned the passage of Measure 86 would make it harder to obtain kicker funds for education.
“The impact of Measure 86 on education is not as direct as that of some of the other measures because it does not specifically decrease education funding,” Piercy said. “But it reduces the flexibility of the legislature in appropriating kicker money for state programs.”
Bob Bruce, spokesman for the Oregon University System, also questions giving the kicker constitutional protection.
“The kicker is normally not likely to go towards education anyway, but Measure 86 makes that possibility even more remote,” Bruce said. “Oregon schools may need that extra boost in the future.”
But others say Measure 86 will help ensure government accountability and secure money that should belong to taxpayers and companies in the first place. Brian J. Boquist, director of the North Indian Creek Ranch, ICI Cattle & Timber Co., says the measure is a sensible way to hold spending by elected officials in check.
“The people of Oregon have supported the kicker because it returns money to them that is rightfully theirs,” Boquist said, “and I believe they will continue to do so.”