By STEPHEN STETSON
It’s a very common sentiment to want the legislative session to end.
Some folks, including myself, work in the world of public policy and are exhausted by trying to shape the state to conform with a particular vision and make our home a better place. Other folks simply believe that lawmakers are at their least dangerous when they are back home and not casting any votes. Whatever the case, in moments like the present, when there are only a few days left in the annual legislative session, it’s very common to see people looking at the clock like elementary school students counting down the hours until summer vacation.
But let’s not rush to the exits just yet. There’s still some important work to do. And unlike some public policy issues, this one shouldn’t be too heavy of a lift.
If lawmakers will bear down, there’s still enough time to pass a proposal to lift the sales tax on menstrual hygiene products, maternity clothing, diapers and infant formula.
Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur, originally brought the proposal, saying that “it makes no sense that the state or cities and counties should be taxing a necessity like this that’s visited on one gender.” Sen. Orr, a staunch Republican budget chair in the state Senate put the case in no uncertain terms. “We need to support families and those having children,” he said.
Sen. Orr’s proposal came on the heels of a multi-decade-long conversation about how the state gets its revenue, and whether it’s fair to get so much of the state’s vital budget dollars from a sales tax on groceries. A bipartisan majority of the legislature, including some of its most conservative members, voted last session to slowly begin taking the state portion of sales tax off of groceries. It doesn’t make sense to tax life’s true necessities, the reasoning goes, especially when it disproportionately punishes low-income folks.
Nearly every state in the nation agrees, finding other ways to fund schools and roads and bridges.
The grocery tax repeal is still a work in progress, phasing out slowly and conditioned on state revenues being sufficient, but the momentum stemming from the conversation was sufficient to provoke Sen. Orr’s SB 62, which would remove the state’s portion of the sales tax on these vital products, equally as necessary to daily life as milk and eggs. Anyone who has had to purchase tampons and pads, much less diapers and infant formula, can attest to the recurring significant expense of these items.
Sen. Orr’s proposal passed the Alabama Senate with virtually no controversy. A version of Sen. Orr’s bill has also made it through the House of Representatives, HB 236 by Rep. Neil Rafferty, D-Birmingham. The political differences between Sen. Orr and Rep. Rafferty are an excellent demonstration of just how popular this bipartisan idea is. But it doesn’t matter whether you want to see it pass because you think it’s an issue of fairness, or whether you just like cutting taxes, it’s important that some version of these proposals – and it doesn’t matter which one – makes it across the finish line before the legislature goes home for the year.
One of the best parts about a proposal like this is that the money saved by consumers will invariably get reinvested in the economy – likely in the same store on the same visit. A mom who doesn’t have to pay taxes on a case on infant formula can afford other food and baby supplies. A teenager who isn’t taxed on menstrual hygiene products can throw a few other school supplies into the shopping cart.
Ultimately, whether this proposal gets sent to the governor is simply a matter of timing and priorities – and whether you reach out to your lawmaker and remind them that you’d like to see this proposal become law. There are plenty of issues that can clog things up as the final days of the session tick past. But this ought to be one that is a no-brainer. It’s a politically popular tax cut that puts real money back in the pockets of Alabamians. It’s pro-family and in line with the kinds of common sense ideas that lawmakers use in their campaigns.
And once they pass this tax cut? I think it’s almost time for summer vacation.
Stetson is the state director in Alabama for Planned Parenthood Southeast.