State Sen. Hansen on Hopes for Special Session

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
We know pretty much what the governor'sposition is. We have heard some of
the opposing voices, but we haven'theard a lot from sitting state senators who
will be in the middle of that. And Ben Hansen of Blair District sixteen
is one of them. And SenatorHanson joins us for a few minutes this
morning. Ben, Good morning Gary. What do you think is possible relative

(00:25):
to the governor's call here to reducein a major way property taxes on Nebraskans.
Well, if you even viewing thelegislature within the last two three years,
you can pretty much guess anything's possible. Okay, what do you think
is likely? Then? Well,I'll tell you what. This is the

(00:47):
first time I've been involved in theseproperty tax committees or you know, groups
of senators who try to come upwith ideas and plan and so I've really
kind of gotten involved quite a bitmore because I usually and involve a lot
more of the HHS stuff and medicaidand trying to fix some things over on
that end. And so when Iagreed to do this, I discussed with

(01:07):
the governor when he asked me,I said, I'm only going to get
involved if we're actually going to discusstrue property tax reform and not relief.
I guess time is time we needto kind of steer the ship away from
iceberg here and kind of think ofsome new ideas and something different. I
tell you what this, Within sixyears of being state sanded, this is
the first time I've actually felt reallyencouraged that a we're actually discussing property tax

(01:30):
reform new and bold ideas, andsecond, we're thinking with our constituents in
mind, like the people first insteadof lobby or special interest. And I
think that's that's a pretty big thingand sometimes difficult for some sinners to do,
you know, put all their feelingsand other thoughts aside from lobbyists and
other people they've known, whether it'sin local government, and actually think of

(01:51):
the people first. So it's lookingpretty good so far. Actually, broad
strokes, do you like what thegovernor has laid out his plan? Yeah?
Yees, yeah, from what he'scommunicated so far, I think in
order to so first of all,we were talking about sales tax resumptions beforehand.
Right now I think we're dissessing thatbefore. And I think that's always
been kind of an area of contention. I think which makes sense when there's

(02:15):
the hope of property tax relief.Right, Like, guy, if we
get rid of if we get ridof sales tax resumptions and take that money
and throw over here and do somethingthere, and you know, move the
cards around the table, and hopefullywe'll have property tax relief if local government
and the schools do their job.Yaha, yaha. Right, And so
a lot of people, well,you know, the people of Nebraska are
pretty good at a smelling bs,you know, and so it's it's not

(02:38):
very trustworthy on the idea of hope. I think, right, like,
well, if we hopefully, ifthis happens, then we'll have property tax
relief. And so I said,the only way you can talk about sales
tax resumptions, which is what we'restill doing, is now with hope both
guaranteed immediate property tax relief. Right, people see when they look at their
property tax statement the next time,there's a huge reduction in that. And

(03:00):
so I said, well, theonly way you're ever going to really look
at that is that the state takesover it's constitutional obligation of funding public education
fully. Yeah, so start startpaying public education with sales and income tax
instead of local property tax. That'sthe first start you'll start seeing fifty to
sixty percent of your private text isgone. Boom right there. State Senator
Van Hanson from Fine community of Skyler, Nebraska. You're a chiropractor when you're

(03:23):
not doing this, which pretty muchmakes you a part time chiropractor. When
you're a full time state senator fortwelve thousand dollars a year, you don't
get a sales tax on chiropractic services. Now, what if? What if
Jim Peldon came to you and said, Okay, Ben, one of the
things we want to do is taxchiropractic services at five and a half percent.

(03:44):
What do you say? What doyou say? You told me,
You told me. Yes, ifyou can tell me, fifty to sixty
percent of my property text are goingto be gone on my building, in
my house. Okay, yeah.So why is it that's exactly right and
the math is clear to me too. Why is it that members of the
agricultural community don't that when they talkabout it two percent sales tax on their
inputs and they freak out without lookingat the back end, which is what

(04:06):
you just described. You know,I've been wondering that and I actually had
a good discussion with senat Erdman,and he brought up a point that I
didn't really kind of think about.So, as a business owner, on
my end, I can I canchange how I am going to build my
patients, right, I can increase, I can increase my bill to my
patients. It's much more difficult forfarmers to do that on their end because

(04:29):
they can't just increase the price ofcorn. Right, And so some of
that makes sense from that aspect,but also the idea that inputs can be
a double taxation in a way.But one of the things I know,
you know that have been discussed isthe possibility of bag machinery. But then
you also include manufacturing machinery in thatas well, right, because I pay
for my you know, if Ibuy anything in my clinic, I have

(04:50):
to pay sales tax. And sobut again I'm not in favor of inputs
being tax and that isn't really evenon the table from from my knowledge.
So but you tell again, anyfarmer, Look, you pay sales tax
in your agg machinery, but we'regoing to produce your property tax by fifty
six percent. You know, Ialmost guarantee you ninety percent I'm gonna be

(05:12):
like, hell, yeah, wellthen why don't we get ninety percent of
AG senators in the state of Nebraskato believe that? Because they because the
farm bureaus pushed back against this,Senator Van Hanson, they said, no,
that's a non starter. What doyou mean a non starter? Yes,
here it is. Here's the differencewith the hope that it's going to
change. Right, let's put asoft cap on schools. Let's let's let's

(05:32):
put soft caps here and there.But if you say your next statement,
when your schools come off your propertytaxes, it's going to happen because now
the state's gonna start taking it over. That's kind of a different narrative.
Now, there's a different ways oflooking to think. So I think that's
that's that's one of the big differences. I think we're gonna end up seeing
realfully Okay. And we all knowthat the magic number down there is thirty

(05:53):
three. Man. We also knowthat you've got that push back which we
just discussed, and the teachers unionhas lost their mind long ago and then
certainly on this on this issue.And we all we also know I do
just talking to many states senators overthe years that the lobby hast basically run
that place. So how do howdo we get the thirty three Ben Hansen?

(06:16):
Oh, you just see, that'sthat's the twenty five million dollar question,
right. And when we when wesat down with these in these in
these meetings, day one, oneof the first things I said is I
looked around the room. I said, the tough one of the toughest decisions
we're going to make here, especiallywith more of a bold idea and a
new direction, is thinking about yourconstituents first and the lobby second. The

(06:36):
lobby is always in your ear right. The constituents aren't there as often.
The lobby you see almost every dayhas some nice constituents you don't, and
so it's like putting them first.Is the people's plan now, not the
lobby, is not the special interest. It's the people's plan first. And
I think that's the direction we're taking. And that says, this is why
I'm kind of feeling a lot moreencouraging than I have in the past.

(06:59):
Well, you're right, because stituentsare out there working, okay, they're
actually earning a living, trying topay these confiscatorily high property taxes. While
lobbyists are getting one hundred and fiftyto five hundred dollars an hour. Yeah,
so bad against lobbyists. I don'tsay, you know, there's a
purpose that they're there, right,each one of our industries, yours and
advertisement mining, chiropractical, they're allthere for reasons to kind of fight for

(07:21):
their industry. I don't blame onebit. But in this aspect, we
have to worry more about people peoplegetting taxed, other homes and leaving our
state. To me, that's moredire of a of an issue that we
have to address and think of first. So so hopefully on this end looking
at funding public education, in mymind, I think it's a direction I

(07:44):
think we I would like to go. I mean, it looks like maybe
that's what we're looking at, soyou can address property taxes on that end.
But then also how do you addressland values and assessments right, because
that's I know, my email boxesand fills the brand with people complaining of
which they should. So one ofthe things I would like to see,
and I'm surprised not doing it now, is as your land values and your

(08:07):
assessments go up, these taxing authorities, counties, cities, entergies, sids.
They should automatically lower the levee basedon what your assessments go up.
I don't know why we're not doingthat now. That's that's the Plat Institute
has made that the foundation of theirtax policy of how to lower retaxation.
That was those think postcard bill thatI've had. So this is almost the

(08:28):
next step to that. And thenyou know, but give them something,
give them CPI gave inflation. Butif they go above that, again,
put the people first. Take itto a vote to the people. Then
if they want to go above inflation, take it to vote to the people.
And the findersciber they want their taxesto go up A man, senator,
thank you, Senator ben Hansen.I had a special session coming up
in a couple of weeks here