Monzel v. Ghiz for Republican nomination to County Commission

It’s shaping up to be two Cincinnati Council members against each other vying for the Hamilton County Commission seat being vacated (thankfully) by David Pepper, who is running for State Treasurer. Both Chris Monzel and Leslie Ghiz have indicated to COASTers that they will be seeking the Republican nomination for the open Commission seat. Both have a long history as politicians and significant voting records on Cincinnati City Council on which to judge their candidacies. COAST looks forward to being part of a vibrant debate between these two seasoned politicians this spring.

Drake Levy Officially Expires

Miracle of miracles! An agency actually drops off the tax rolls

December 31 was an important milestone in Hamilton County tax-fighting history.  On that date, the Drake Center ceased to be a recipient of County tax dollars. Prior to that date, the Drake Center and its 240 patients were receiving a monthly cash subsidy of more than $1 million, $14 million annually.

In 2004, COAST General Council Chris Finney Chaired the Hamilton County Tax Levy Review Committee and Phil Heimlich was President of the Hamilton County Commission.  Together, they uncovered massive waste at Drake Center, and demonstrated that no other rehabilitation facility like Drake in the nation received a similar local tax subsidy.  That year, a 5-year levy passed over their objections.

However, in 2006, Commissiones DeWine and Heimlich courageously negotiated a sale of the Drake Center to the Health Alliance.  Part of that deal was that after the expiration of the 2004 levy, the Drake Center would be operated without tax subsidy.

When the Health Alliance management team, led by skilled executive Karen Bankston took over, they revealed that the waste at Drake Center was even worse than Finney and Heimlich had uncovered.

Now, Drake Center’s quality measures are much improved, and it actually makes money every month, instead of hemorrhaging taxpayer cash.

COAST was instrumental in fighting the tax, against all of the predictable establishment organizations supporting the wasteful tax, including the Cincinnati Enquirer, the Cincinnati Post, the Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce, the AFL-CIO, and the United Way.  Of course, all of these organizations predicted unmentionable calamity of the taxpayer subsidy of the Drake Center’s was discontinued, and their predictions were dutifully supported by a study from the University of Cincinnati’s Center for Economic Studies.

So, celebrate this one small victory for common sense, in the face of all of the establishment nay-sayers who always think higher taxes are a dandy idea.

Happy New year from COAST!!!

Leave your many fond recollections of COAST in the comments.

COASTers celebrate the Christmas Season

Thanks to everybody who joned us at Slatts Pub to celebrate the holidays. We had a fabulous turnout and everyone had a great time.

David Pepper’s “Deeply Illegitimate Act”

David Pepper betrays his own promises,
and Hamilton County taxpayers

It is hardly unusual for politicians to lie to us about their intentions on raising our taxes – we have come to expect that.  It is extraordinary, however, for a politician to tell us in advance that such an act on their part would be nothing short of treachery. 

Commissioner David Pepper not only went back on his repeated promises not to reduce the Stadium Property Tax Rollback, but a year ago told us that this very act that he undertook – independent of fiscal considerations -- would be a “deeply illegitimate act.”  This is an important, defining issue for Hamilton County.

David Pepper told Hamilton County voters on his own blog that it did not matter the fiscal state of the Stadium Fund –“Fulfilling the PTR Promise -- Some Things are Simple” – he would firmly oppose all efforts to eliminate or reduce the Property Tax Rollback that was an integral part of the 1996 deal with the voters.

What the readers of the Enquirer will never learn – because the Enquirer refuses to tell us – is that Pepper and fellow liberal democrat Commissioner Todd Portune have made the Stadium Fund deficit infinitely worse by voting to add hundreds of millions of dollars in new spending for the Banks project since they took office – spending from an insolvent fund.

Thus, Pepper’s treachery is all the more pronounced.  He scored the amazing trifecta of duplicity by (i) promising never to reduce the rollback, (ii) voting to accelerate spending to make the deficit worse, and (iii) then voting to reduce the rollback, brazenly claiming he had no other option.  Even worse, pepper received more than $40,000 in contributions for his County Commission race from Bengals executives and attorneys to do their bidding on the Commission.

David Pepper, who voted when he first joined the Commission for the “Super-Sized Jail Tax,” without submitting it to a vote of the electorate, has shown himself unqualified for the office he currently holds.  He is utterly unworthy of the promotion to State Auditor, a post he is currently seeking.

COASTers save Stadium Property Tax Rollback

Despite David Pepper’s treachery, calls and letters from COASTers in response to repeated COAST calls to action saved the full Stadium Property Tax Rollback on Monday, November 30.  Because of an overwhelming outpouring of support from COASTer’s clearly and firmly demanding retention of the rollback, Commissioners Portune and Hartman voted to save the rollback for 2009, forcing the County to scale back spending form the insolvent fund and cut elsewhere to fund its deficit.

Thank you COASTers!!!

Stadium Fiscal Fiasco Featured in New York Times

Hamilton County voters have been oppressed by the worst deal stadium deal in the nation thanks to current Bengals executives Bob Bedinghaus and Jeff Berding.  COAST has documented the torment of the taxpayers ever since.  Now the New York Times has featured the fiasco on its front page over the holidays.  Read it here – Stadium Boom Deepens Municipal Woes.

Behind-The-Scenes Intrigue of Stadium Property Tax Rollback

"et tu, Todd?!?"

There’s plenty of back-stabbing and intrigue on the intense Stadium property tax rollback story in the halls of the County Courthouse.

We got ourselves into the Stadium financing mess in Hamilton County not because of the Reds, Bengals, and unprincipled politicians.  Indeed greedy team owners and selfish politicians did what they are expected to do – act in their self-interest. 

However, the media and the voters were asleep at the switch following the Stadium Sales Tax vote in 1996, leading to the disaster that generated many headlines, including the recent New York Times feature story.

Even worse, the voters and media are ignoring the story happening right under our noses today, exacerbating the misery of Hamilton County taxpayers.

·                     The local media steadfastly refuses to cover the continued spending of hundreds of millions of dollars from the bankrupt Stadium Fund by Commissioners Portune and Pepper, making the fiscal prospects of the fund without a tax increase or general fund subsidy impossible and the situation more urgent than it otherwise would be.  Why do they insist on ignoring the story?

·                     The Stadium Fund fiasco and Pepper’s broken promises has created a significant rift between Commissioner Portune and Pepper, including last-minute back-stabbing and name calling.  Their character shines through.

·                     Lost in the story of Portune’s vote against a property tax increase is Portune’s continuing drive towards yet another massive sales tax increase.  Methodically throughout the County’s budget processes since the failure of his sales tax hike in 2007, including in the recent Stadium Fund vote, Portune has resisted cutting spending, and dipping into reserves, making a sales tax more likely in 2010 or 2011.  Like all liberals, Portune never gives up.

·                     Finally, we rarely see a politician “outed” like Pepper has been on the rollback vote – calling his own position “deeply illegitimate” and providing a clear roadmap to the logic of his treachery.  Not one media outlet has covered his duplicity.

And we wonder how we got into this position to begin with!  As a community, let’s stop sweeping things under the rug.

Five bad Republicans join Strickland and democrats to raise Ohio income taxes

After sixteen years of Bob Taft and George Voinovich, and lemming-like Republican leadership in the House and Senate such as Jean Schmidt, Ohioans have gotten used to Republicans voting in favor of every single bad tax-and-spending bad idea to come up in Columbus.  Five Republican Senators sold us out once again.

However, under House Minority leader Bill Bachelder, a committed conservative voice in Columbus, and following the disastrous 2006 elections when Republicans lost all but one non-judicial statewide office, we thought maybe they had learned their lessons.  We were wrong. 

When the Ohio Supreme Court declared that proposal to bring slot machines to Ohio racetracks was subject to a referendum, it created an $800 million hole in Ohio’s budget.  Predictably, democrat Governor Strickland and democrat leaders in the Ohio House and Senate proposed an income tax hike for Ohio’s already-oppressed taxpayers. 

House Republicans were united in their opposition to the Stickland plan.  Moreover, we appeared to be saved by a firewall against tax increases erected by the Republcian-controlled Senate.  Over Thanksgiving, the Senate adjoured without acting on the Strickland tax hike proposal.  Then, in mid-December, Senate president Bill Harris, Clermont County Senator Tom Niehaus, Mark Wagoner of suburban Toledo, and John Carey and David Goodman both of suburban Columbus.

COAST thanks Hamilton County Republican Party Chairman Alex Triantifilou for condemning the traitorous acts of these so-called Republicans. 

We encourage the remaining Republicans in the Senate to act like Republicans and remove these traitors from their leadership posts in the Ohio Senate.

Driehaus aide convicted of election fraud

Media again hides dirty democrat secret

Local Enquirer readers in October and November learned about a paid campaign worker for the pro-casino, Issue 3 campaign’s conviction for election fraud.  What the local media failed to report was that this felon was instrumental in the 2008 election of Steve Driehaus to the United States Congress.  COAST wonders if the remainder of his campaign is as dirty.

Walter Sullivan, a worker for a vendor promoting State Issue 3 legalizing four casinos in Ohio, was caught in October of falsifying multiple absentee ballot applications as a first step toward stuffing the ballot box.  In December, he pled guilty to five  felony charges and was placed on two years of probation by Hamilton County Common Pleas Court Judge Pat DeWine.

What the media refuses to report, however, is that Sullivan was part of the democrat machine that helped elect democrat Steve Driehaus to Congress.  Read his resume here where Sullivan lists his employment with the Driehaus campaign.

On his myspace page, Sullivan calls himself “’Nati Thug” and brags of association with the Obama campaign, ACORN  and the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee (http://www.myspace.com/nati_thug ).  One listed group, Grassroots Campaigns, who hired him starting in August of 2008, lists both the DCCC and ACORN as clients (http://grassrootscampaigns.com/clients.php ).

Cincinnati Residents Avoid Trash Tax (for now)

New Council member Laure Quinlivan
wants trash tax on City residents

Four Council members, the Mayor and City manager are committed to imposing a $20 per month trash tax on Cincinnati residents, the same residents who are being driven from their homes in record foreclosures due to already-high property taxes. 

Thanks to COAST members who called and wrote their Council members, and Council members Leslie Ghiz, Chris Monzel, Charlie Winburn, Jeff Berding and Chris Bortz, that trash tax was not included in the 2010 budget.

COASTers should be aware that new Council member Laure Quinlivin, and Council veterans Cecil Thomas, Laketa Cole, and Roxanne Qualls all supported raising the trash tax.  Because Council closed its budget gap by spending down its reserves rather than cutting spending and because big government advocates never go away, COAST confidently predicts that the trash tax proposal will be back again.

City Settles COAST Lawsuit Over Harassment of Petitioners

The City of Cincinnati as well as the operators of Fountain Square and Findlay Market have agreed to stop harassing COASTers collecting signatures on petitions for ballot issues.  The broad settlement agreement, finalized in November, allows petitioners to collect signatures peacefully on sidewalks, public streets, Fountain Square and throughout Findlay Market without registering in advance and without harassment from Cincinnati’s finest.

COAST and WeDemandAVote.Com petitioners were harassed collecting signatures in these City venues for the past three years for the Super-Sized Jail Tax, Red Light Cameras, Proportional Representation, the Cincinnati trolley and the Water Works proposal.  In addition to the broad relief afforded COAST and WeDemand petitioners, the defendants paid COAST attorneys fees of $7,500.

Great Tax Protesters of History: Lady Godiva

We want more tax protesters
like Lady Godiva!

So often, advocates of bigger, more oppressive government position their cause as "good" versus the "evil" of those seeking more liberty and more limited government. 

Of course, nothing could be further from the truth, but with a massive government public relations machine, a complicit media, a massive dependent non-profit sector, and rapacious politicians and bureaucrats backing this theory, it’s an uphill battle to fight.

So, in this edition of COAST news, we highlight one of the many heros of limited government and lower taxes: Lady Godiva.

The namesake of a fine Chocolate for sure, and titillatingly famous for riding around town on her horse completely naked, the story behind Lady Godiva’s fame is really in fighting against higher taxes.

Lady Godiva (1040-1080), was an Anglo-Saxon noblewoman who, according to legend, rode naked through the streets of Coventry, in England, in order to gain a remission of the oppressive taxation imposed by her husband on his tenants.  Read more about Lady Godiva here.

COAST's wish for the New Year in 2010 is that we have more female tax fighters like Lady Godiva!

Pepper Seeks New Government Teat To Suckle

Freedom Center in talks to lean on Federal Government

Too many pigs suckling on state and local government
Forces Freedom Center to look to Washington

After sucking more than $70 million from the City of Cincinnati, Hamilton County, and the State of Ohio with over-hyped attendance projections and financial performance (read: lies), the National Underground Freedom Center appears to have run out of luck getting more state and local funding. 

Thus, it has now turned to the Federal government as a new teat to suckle for its endless operating losses and capital budget needs.  The Federal Government, as everyone knows, is the source of endless largess and unlimited funds, and will hold no one accountable to  silly standards like attendance and fiscal performance goals.  The failed Freedom Center is brought to you courtesy of former Procter & Gamble Chairman and Current Walt Disney Corporation Chairman John Pepper, who of course could affored to endow the institution against the losses he created if he so chose. 

Portune For Something, Anything

Does anyone other than the editors of the COAST Newsletter think it is funny that County Commissioner Todd Portune floats his name out there for any and every job opening? 

Just like the media chased the story of the boy in the balloon, perhaps the only thing funnier is that the pliant editors of our local news rags – with no confirmation from anyone other than Portune – dutifully continue to run each of these self-promoting rumors.  Perhaps we should call Portune “balloon boy” for his all-too-frequent attempts at self-promotion.

COAST here takes a tour of the recent Portune trial balloons, all of which have fallen flat.

Read here how Portune promoted himself for Chairman of the Ohio Democrat Party.  This effort failed.

Read here how Portune promoted himself for Ohio Lieutenant Governor. 

Read here how Portune floated his own name for the United States Senate.

And here how he promoted himself for Ohio Attorney General

COAST also remembers him toying with the idea of running for Congress against Steve Chabot, but can’t immediately find that link. 

Don’t get us wrong, we want Portune to go – leave the County Commission.  It’s just that no one will take him!

Will it get as bad as Pittsburgh?

Just when we think it can’t get any worse, it does.  In Pittsburgh, having run all for-profit businesses out of town, they are seriously considering taxing college tuition.  We are not kidding!

Students also point out that the tax would not be covered by financial aid — a poor undergraduate on a full scholarship at Carnegie Mellon would be hit with the same $400 tax as her wealthiest fellow student.

A Belated COAST Correction

COAST hates to make mistakes, but wants to acknowledge and correct them when we do.  In a pre-election e-mail COAST said of the local ballot issues that “no agency stands to lose more than about 15% of their funding if their levy fails.”  This was not true.  The MRDD levy funds the vast majority of their services.  The MRDD levy passed in November.

COAST Symphony Night Scheduled

We like Tchaik!

COAST Symphony Night has been scheduled for Thursday, February 4. The Symphony that evening features Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings and Symphony No. 4.  It will be a great evening out with fellow anti-taxers.  If you are interested in joining us, please e-mail COASTer Chris Finney.