Join me in voting no on 1A. It is a matter of how we tax in Durango, not whether we should tax. In Durango, when we say “sales tax,” that also means the immoral taxing of groceries. We should abandon the immoral sales tax on groceries. In the late 1970s, Colorado abandoned grocery sales taxes, allowing economically depressed localities to keep the tax in order to provide necessary services. Durango is not economically depressed. Taxing groceries is not progressive; it is not Christian; it is not conservative. Whatever your convictions, join me in asking the City Council to abandon the grocery sales tax.
Progressive taxing is taxing on a sliding scale matched to people’s incomes. Sales tax on groceries taxes everyone the same. To tax poor people for their groceries is to add to their burden. Jesus said what we do for the least is what we do for him. Do we wish to add to the burden of the poor? A conservative approach to funding recreation would be to attach a user fee so that only the beneficiaries pay for the enjoyment. Indeed, the poor may apply to Durango for a rebate of their grocery sales tax. The thought drips with irony. It only applies to city residents (where recent, ongoing policy makes clear we want no poor people in Durango). How are they to know? Who among them will make the application?
In time, a moral City Council may be seated that will vote to abandon Durango’s immoral grocery sales tax, or the state may forbid grocery sales tax at all.
When that happens, the ½-cent tax will be decimated as only nongrocery items will be taxed. Now, before we plan projects dependent on the payout of an immoral tax, let us reimagine how we will tax ourselves for our obligations, our needs, and our wants. Let us abandon the grocery sales tax. What say you, candidates?
Neil A. Bourjaily
Durango
