By Zack Anchors



If you believe Roy Lenardson– one of the most prominent players in the
pro-TABOR movement– the state of Maine is on the verge of a virtual
apocalypse.



“Maine is disappearing off the map,” he told the South Portland City Council last week. “We are managing our demise.”



This, and a barrage of other alarming forecasts, from a man who has consistently accused his opponents of using scare tactics.



The council invited Lenardson to make a presentation on the Taxpayer’s
Bill of Rights after hosting a similar presentation a few weeks before
by Jeff Austin of the anti-TABOR Maine Municipal Association. Austin
made it clear that he thinks passage of TABOR would be bad for the
state but he also repeated more than once, “if this passes, nobody
really knows what will happen.” Austin’s argument against TABOR was
based much less on inciting fear than on a detailed analysis of
different aspects of the actual referendum. Whether or not that
analysis was sound is a matter worthy of debate.



Lenardson took a different tack. He spent his allotted time with the
council trying to persuade them that our state in is in hopeless shape
and is run by awful people who can’t be trusted--”those fancy people in
Augusta,” he called them. He offered an apology for dwelling on all the
“depressing” information but then provided more. The overall thrust of
his argument was that TABOR, in some vague way, would be a first step
at fixing nearly all of Maine’s problems. TABOR would cause lower
taxes, he said, which would attract more business to Maine and increase
prosperity for all.

At one point in his presentation, Lenardson referred to the recently
issued report by the Brookings Institute, “Charting Maine’s Future:
Quality Places. Lenardson had some problems with specific
recommendations of the study, but claimed that overall, “it’s a good
report.” That’s interesting, because many of the fundamental findings
of the report are completely at odds with Lenardson’s bleak assessment
of our state. The report concludes that Maine “is surprisingly
well-positioned for the future” and that one of the keys to increasing
prosperity is to leave behind our unfounded pessimism. The report
refutes two of the major premises of Lenardson’s argument--that the
state is “disappearing” (losing its population), and that the state’s
economy is in the midst of a crises (To read it for yourself, find the
report at www.growsmartmaine.com).



There are certainly abundant challenges facing Maine– especially in the
more rural areas of the state– and there are certainly dramatic changes
that need to be made on a range of issues, including taxation. But when
Lenardson says that I-95 is turning into a “drain-pike, when it should
be a business-pike,” I have a hard time eliciting the fear that he
seems intent on stirring. As the Brookings report suggests, there is a
plenty to be optimistic about:



“As the search for quality places grows in importance, Maine possesses
a globally known ‘brand’ built on images of livable communities,
stunning scenery, and great recreational opportunities. Likewise, as
‘innovation’ drives more of the economy, Maine’s reputation for Yankee
ingenuity and resourcefulness matters more.”

Struggling places in Maine like my hometown— Old Town— need all the
help they can get in transforming their old economic model into an
innovation-driven, diversified one. While Lenardson and others at the
Heritage Policy Center have been busy doomsaying and peddling TABOR as
a fix-all, “those fancy people in Augusta” have worked out a deal that
will turn Old Town’s closed down mill into just the sort of
twenty-first century business we need in the state—a bio-refinery that
will produce renewable energy and 1000 well-paying jobs.



It is certainly frustrating that our leaders have so far failed to
deliver sufficient tax reform, but TABOR should be considered on its
own merits, not based on their shortcomings. I am skeptical of any
measure that is primarily driven by cynicism and fear. That seems
wholly the case with the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. When residents
decide how to vote on this issue, I hope they will consider whether or
not TABOR is a well-written, sensible and pragmatic measure and set
aside the efforts of political propagandists.