November 9, 2006

Tax Refendum Idea Already Spreading

Nashville City Paper has a good story examining whether the city charter amendment passed overwhelmingly by Nashville voters Tuesday giving themselves the right to vote on property tax increases is allowed under the state constitution - and whether Metro government will challenge the amendment in court.

I can't see how either side of the constitutional debate can test the constitutionality in court until either after Metro Council tries to pass a property tax rate increase without holding a referendum, or after a referendum is held. Seems to me that until one or the other of those scenarios happens no one on either side has grounds for a lawsuit.

But be that as it may, I think it will be political suicide to challenge the constitutionality of the charter amendment given that it passed with 77 percent of the vote..

Meanwhile, as I predicted yesterday, passage of the amendment is already sparking interest in other cities in Tennessee.

Memphis blogger John Harvey, author of the excellent Voting in Memphis blog which tracks the ongoing inability and/or refusal of the Shelby County Election Commission to run clean elections and prevent dead folks from voting, is starting to push for a similar charter amendment in Memphis.

A word of advice to Tennessee's Republican Party leadership and to Republicans in the state House and state Senate: Grab on to this issue now, and file legislation to amend the state constitution to clear up the constitutional confusion and explicitly authorize cities to hold referendums on tax increases if voters approve such city charter changes.

It's a majority-building kind of issue.

Update: Ben Cunningham submitted this as a comment, but I thought it deserved being added as an update:

An additional note about the Constitutionality of the Charter Amendment. Here is a paragraph from the March 2006 TN Supreme Court decision on term limits in Shelby County. The justices were VERY clear that citizens have a constitutional right to self-determination in chartered county governments:

"Furthermore, we note that Article I, section 1, of Tennessee's constitution provides that the people have an unalienable and indefeasible right to alter, reform, or abolish the government in such manner as they may think proper. The constitution is the truest expression of the will of the people, and it is their intent in adopting a constitutional provision that must prevail. See Williams v. Carr, 404 S.W.2d 522, 526 (Tenn. 1966). Accepting the plaintiff's position in this case would require us to ignore the fundamental principle of self-government embodied in Article I, section 1. This we are not willing to do. Instead, we continue to adhere to the principle that the constitution does not mandate a uniform structure of county governments across the state. It specifically authorizes legislation creating different forms of local government, and the General Assembly has very broad powers and discretion in this regard. Leech, 588 S.W.2d at 272. Although the plaintiffs argue that such an approach to Article VII invites chaos, we are aware of no evidence to support such a conclusion, and none has been cited to us."