District 48 Sen. Brian Hardin says there may be more work that needs to be done on the bill that would ultimately end property taxation by community colleges, but that work won’t happen in a vacuum.
Hardin was asked for his thoughts on LB783, the Governor’s bill that would replace such tax funding with state aid, during his first Rolls and Issues event Thursday morning, sponsored by the Scottsbluff-Gering Chamber of Commerce.
Chamber Director and WCCA Board Vice-Chair Karen Anderson asked about the impact the bill would have on community college’ s ability to fund capital improvements, which Hardin said is a concern that needs to be addressed.
“Anytime there’s change, it makes all of us twitch; me too. And we also have the tension of ‘how’s that working for us’,” said Hardin. “I think It seems to be an attempt to help make everything work differently, from the perspective that our whole tax package, as a state, is not very competitive. That’s selling it on the light side.”
Hardin noted there are probably more tax-related measures this year than ever, and this measure is just one of the tax changes sought by the Governor, and others.
He said there will be a lot of time spent this year on how any one change affects all other taxes, and so lawmakers can’t really look at any one bill in isolation from the rest.
