Complete 2007 Position Statement
Math-Science
Curriculum Changes l
Community Colleges l
Sales Tax Reporting
Reform
Local Option Sales Tax
Authority l Garvee Bonding
l Huetter By-Pass
Coeur d'Alene Basin
Cleanup l Science & Technology
Stimulus
LEGISLATIVE PHILOSOPHY - The Chamber Board of Directors
adopted the Policy Statements below after input from our
members and considerable work by the Public Policy
Committee, the Natural Resources Committee, and the
Education Committee. They are intended to serve as
guidelines or criteria by which the Chamber can evaluate its
support or opposition to specific issues of public policy.
APPROPRIATIONS The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of
Commerce supports government spending to the extent that the
needs of Idahoans are best served, and the programs and
institutions established and controlled by the various
levels of government are maintained in a fiscally
responsible manner.
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of
Commerce believes that the health of our federal, state, and
local economies is critical to the quality of life in our
community, and supports the development and implementation
of prudent economic development programs and policies at the
federal, state, and local levels.
EDUCATION The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports the establishment and maintenance of a system of
education, both public and private, that prepares students
to become successful contributors to society and that
provides our citizens sufficient training opportunities to
ensure skilled employees for our member businesses.
GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of
Commerce believes that the role of government is to provide
only those services that individuals and private enterprise
do not adequately provide for the community. We further
believe that policies, rules, and regulations should be
limited to those necessary to preserve public safety, our
quality of life, and the integrity of the free enterprise
system.
HUMAN RESOURCES The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of
Commerce believes the employer/employee relationship is best
left to the parties involved and that both costs and
benefits should be fully considered and balanced for any and
all mandates imposed by government that affect that
relationship.
HUMAN RIGHTS The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
believes in the value to our community of all persons,
regardless of their gender, race, creed, age, national
origin, or religion and supports efforts to safeguard the
rights granted to all people by our Constitution.
LEGAL The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports a legal system that recognizes the importance of
access to legal remedies and that promotes a predict able
and stable legal climate.
NATURAL RESOURCES & ENVIRONMENT The Coeur d'Alene Area
Chamber of Commerce supports the sustainable use and
enjoyment of our abundant natural resources, through
responsible stewardship practices compatible with economic
development and outdoor recreational opportunities in
northern Idaho. Further, we believe that a collaborative,
cooperative approach toward natural resource management,
will not only conserve our resources for long-term use and
enjoyment, but also will also protect and create jobs, and
ultimately lead to maintaining a strong and diverse economy.
PUBLIC UTILITIES INFRASTRUCTURE The Coeur d'Alene
Chamber of Commerce supports quality utility services to
ensure a clean environment for the present and future needs
of community. Furthermore, the Chamber believes that
appropriate and adequate utility infrastructure is
fundamental for growth and economic development to occur in
our communities and positively impacts the quality of life
of our residents and visitors.
TAXATION The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports a system of government taxation that is consistent,
predictable, and equitable, and that ensures that the basic
needs of the governed are served.
TRANSPORTATION - The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of
Commerce recognizes that safe and efficient transportation
systems are the carriers of the lifeblood of our economy and
supports an energetic program to improve and maintain North
Idaho's highways, waterways, railways, and airports.
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Education
Position: The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports the State Board of Education's recommendation to
amend the public secondary math/science requirements from
two to three years of instruction.
Rationale: Well educated, workforce ready employees are
critical to the success of business and the prosperity of
the local economy. The State Board of Education's
recommendation to increase the requirements for math and
science in public secondary institutions is a significant
step towards ensuring Idaho's success. Math and science
plays a significant role in the economy of North Idaho, and
are crucial components of higher education. Yet despite
this, many post-secondary schools complain of the cost of
remediation required to get incoming students to the
standards they and the world demand.
Idaho has one of the lowest graduation requirements in
math and science in the country, while in the last 12 months
more than 10 states have raised their requirements including
Utah, Texas, Florida, Kentucky, Michigan, and Ohio. Current
state standards only require students to take two years of
math and two years of science, versus four years of English
and three years of social studies and fine arts. English is
the only course a student must take all four years of high
school.
The state board, in its public forums and meetings
recognized the fact that math and science must play a larger
role in our kids' education, thus recommending not only to
increase math and science curriculum requirements from two
years to three, but to require that one of the math classes
be taken in the student's senior year. By increasing
academic activity during the student's senior year, the
amount of remediation students require in college and in the
workplace should diminish. Students would also be required
to take algebra and geometry or classes that meet standards.
Yet, within all this the State Board has been responsive
to the needs at the local level. As is consistent with the
Board's recommendation we believe that these changes in
curriculum should not become an unfunded mandate that
impedes on local schools budgets, but that propels them and
their students to success. Districts should have the
flexibility to determine how to implement these changes with
the full financial support of the legislature.
The Coeur d'Alene Chamber of Commerce urges the
legislature to recognize the needs of our businesses-the
competition they face and adopt the State Board of
Education's curriculum change recommendations.
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The Coeur d'Alene Chamber supports the existing method of
creating, funding, and governing community colleges in
Idaho. We do so for the following reasons:
Requiring a majority vote of the citizens of a
county/area to establish a community college and the payment
of property taxes towards its operation ensures that the
citizens of that county truly embrace the institution,
recognize its value, and are willing to manage and help fund
its operations. This system provides for a locally elected
governing body for a community college. This helps ensure
that the colleges will be responsive to the evolving needs
of the region. By their very nature, this is one of the
purposes of such colleges: to be locally based and driven.
Having a locally elected Board of Trustees ensures this
approach.
This approach has yielded lower student costs than other
post secondary institutions in Idaho. We believe it is
critical that post secondary education is available to all
students and the open access and affordability of community
colleges are good ways to do that.
As we discovered during the last legislative session,
efforts to change the system run into all sorts of
complications ranging from how to equitably recompense those
communities that have invested millions of property tax
dollars in existing colleges to questions of how liquor tax
dollars that counties use to underwrite community college
tuition will be apportioned.
We recognize the need to provide citizens of our state
with greater access to the kinds of technical and
professional education and workforce training best provided
by community colleges, and we support the need for greater
community college access in Idaho. We also commend the
existing community colleges and the four year institutions
for their collaboration, and their success at avoiding
duplication of services. Therefore, we make three
suggestions for addressing this need.
First, the Coeur d'Alene Chamber recommends passage of
legislation that would provide a state tax credit of up to
50% of property taxes paid to a community college district.
We believe that such an approach would both preserve the
best aspects of the existing community college districts,
and encourage the creation of new college districts in those
parts of the state that want them by reducing the potential
costs to property tax payers. Further, this avoids the
difficulties involved in asking the State to assume full and
direct responsibility for funding and governing community
colleges.
Secondly, we strongly support a dramatically increased
appropriation of funds to the Idaho Division of Professional
Technical Education. This division provides funding for the
six technical colleges in Idaho as well as supporting
critically important K-12 technical education. We believe
that these added funds would provide a direct and immediate
benefit to Idaho citizens by quickly ramping up the
availability of professional technical education.
Finally, we support reducing the super-majority for the
formation of community college taxing districts. Though
Kootenai County residents have already cleared the hurdle
that established a taxing district that founded North Idaho
College and that provides for continued funding through
property taxes, the Coeur d'Alene Chamber strongly believes
in the current governance and funding mechanism in place.
Changing the criteria away from a super-majority will ensure
that the current mechanism remains viable without
undermining the democratic process nor diminishing the
effort put forth by our local citizens to establish and fund
our community's college.
--back to top-- Tax Policies
Position: The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports the passage of legislation to improve the sales tax
reporting method presently used by the Idaho State Tax
Commission to allow more accurate reporting of collections
in each county.
Rationale: Business people and elected officials in
Kootenai County have long maintained that Idaho State Tax
Commission sales tax statistics grossly under-report
collections in the county. Currently, the tax commission
allows businesses that operate in more than one county or
are headquartered out of state to report collections in
multiple-county or out-of-state categories. The ½-cent sales
tax implemented gives comprehensive proof that, under this
method, Kootenai County's collections are under-reported.
Tax revenue from the ½-cent sales tax exceeded projections
based on current state collection statistics by 25-50
percent.
Therefore, the Coeur d'Alene Chamber supports legislation
that would create a sales tax collection reporting method
that more accurately depicts collections in each county. We
believe more accurate statistics will aid Kootenai County's
economic development efforts.
Position: The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports the passage of legislation that would allow
counties to establish local sales taxes under the following
provisions:
- Must be approved by a majority of those voting in
the county imposing the tax.
- Includes a "sunset" date
- Dedicates a portion of the sales tax proceeds to
property tax reduction
- Dedicates the remaining proceeds to specific
projects defined in the ballot measure and not to the
general fund of the county.
Rationale: Idaho communities face the increasingly
difficult task of raising funds for needed capital projects.
At present, the only option available to elected officials
is to increase local property taxes to raise these funds.
This approach is not acceptable to most property tax payers
and as a result valuable community projects are not
undertaken.
However, as Kootenai County citizens discovered with the
1/2 cent sales tax approval, a local option sales tax that
is tied to property tax reductions is a much better way to
raise funds. This is consistent with our Policy Statement
that our chamber supports "a system of government taxation
that is consistent, predictable, and equitable, and that
ensures that the basic needs of the governed are served."
Therefore, we fully support efforts to enable a local
option sales tax.
--back to top-- Transportation
Position: The Coeur d'Alene Chamber of Commerce supported
2005 legislation that authorized GARVEE Bonding (Grant
Anticipation Revenue Vehicle) for transportation
infrastructure. With that legislation passed, we now support
utilization of those bonds to construct projects proposed by
the Idaho Transportation Department
Rationale: Idaho's highway system is the economic
backbone for business. The demand from interstate commerce
and people driving through Idaho and over its borders
continues to increase rapidly. In the last 10 years, miles
driven by commercial vehicles have increased by 64.5%.
Therefore, continued upgrades to Idaho's aging highway
system are imperative for efficient transportation of state
products and services to markets, as well as for public
safety.
Idaho has been using a "pay-as-you-go" approach to the
construction of new highway projects, using annual revenue
that comes from Idaho Transportation Department's allotment
of federal highway funds, plus state and local matching
funds. This annual allotment is significantly below what is
needed to address Idaho's existing backlog of highway system
improvements. Limiting highway investment to annual federal
funding restricts the size and number of projects that can
be completed on a yearly basis. GARVEE Bonding enables the
State to "fast forward" construction of much needed highway
improvements. Not only will we have these projects done
sooner, but, when inflation is taken into account, at a
better price.
With this new tool in place, the Chamber supports its
continued utilization to improve Idaho's highways.
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Position: The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports the funding and creation of a four lane, limited
access Highway 95 by-pass in the place of the existing
Huetter Road as identified in the Kootenai Metropolitan
Planning Organization (KMPO) traffic analysis.
Rationale: North Idaho continues to face a steep rise in
population and consequentially an increased demand upon our
road infrastructure. As it stands currently Highway 41 is
already beyond capacity when measured at I-90. US 95
continues to face increased traffic demand with limited
capacity to expand to accommodate these flows. It therefore
becomes necessary for alternative solutions to emerge. The
traffic analysis and right of way planning undertaken by
KMPO has identified that solution to be the Huetter By-Pass.
The recently completed traffic analysis sets a footprint for
the expansion of this stretch of road way into a four,
possibly six lane highway capable of absorbing future
traffic flows. This is the most sensible solution available.
Therefore, the Coeur d'Alene Chamber fully supports
future planning efforts, immediate funding for acquisition
of right-of-way, and funding to support the construction
costs of this much needed infrastructure upgrade.
--back to top-- Natural Resources
Position: The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports environmental cleanup efforts in the Coeur d'Alene
River Basin. This cleanup effort should be reasonable and
practical, based on sound science and local input and
support. The Chamber supports the Basin Commission as the
entity that directs this work and supports funding to
provide state match for cleanup activities, along with other
cleanup, maintenance, and management activities.
Rationale: The Chamber in cooperation with other members
of this community worked hard to support a rationale ROD for
the Coeur d'Alene Basin and the establishment of the Basin
Commission as the entity charged with overseeing the
cleanup. As a natural extension of this position, the
Chamber also supports the provision by the State of Idaho of
matching funds needed for federal cleanup funds.
Therefore, the Coeur d'Alene Chamber continues to support
the oversight of the Basin Commission and the on-going
cleanup efforts in the Coeur d'Alene River Basin.
--back to top-- Business Development
Position: The Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce
supports the Governor's Science & Technology Advisory
Council's (GSTAC) draft recommendation of a substantial
increase in state appropriations towards initiatives
intended to enhance Idaho's prowess in science and
technology.
Rationale: The GSTAC in its draft recommendation to the
Governor noted that, "Idaho has significant potential to
grow its science and technology sector, thus growing wages,
opportunities and services to its citizenry." Obviously,
there continues to be a great level of untapped potential in
this state. Anyone who thinks this optimistic look at the
technological potential of the state is a fallacy needs only
to look at the statistics showing Idaho ranked number one
nationally in patents issued per capita. Already, the Idaho
Department of Commerce and Labor reports about 70 percent of
Idaho's exports come from the technology industry. The state
also employs about 50,000 technology workers, who earn an
average of twice the typical wage for the state.
This technological prowess is not confined just to Boise
and Micron. Regionally a partnership between business and
higher education has already provided fruitful results
within the technology realm. Emphasis on science and
technology would compliment the efforts to create a higher
education corridor in Coeur d'Alene. The culmination of
these two efforts could not only see dramatic increases in
regional student enrollment, but innovation and business
entrepreneurship.
The GSTAC recommendation has established a plan to bolster
Idaho's technological prowess by calling for significant
appropriations and tax credits that would enable the state
to increase its role in grant programs, marketing, technical
assistance, and small business innovation and research.
The Coeur d'Alene Chamber of Commerce supports the
recommendations of the Governor's Science & Technology
Advisory Council as it will enhance innovation across the
state while spurring new growth and a stronger Idaho
economy.
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