With agriculture, growing is growing

Today we find ourselves gravely disappointed and frustrated by news from our state government. The result of this news is that an inequitable tax burden will continue to be placed on our small business and specifically on the horticultural industry in the great state of Maine.

Despite numerous legislative efforts over the past 10-plus years (which have all had support by the Legislature), the Appropriations Committee has again refused to accommodate the inclusion of horticulture in the definition of agriculture within the Maine state sales tax code as part of the governor’s supplemental budget recommendations.

In doing so, the choice is made to continue forward with a punitive and unjust double taxation policy – for our industry and for our customers. Virtually all other manufacturers of product are protected from this in the current law. We must pay sales taxes on the goods used to produce our plants and then charge our customers another sales tax when they purchase.

It is quite plain and simply unfair policy. It is time that the state of Maine stepped up to do the right thing. Every other state in the nation as well as the federal government recognizes that growing plants is a form of agriculture in statutory regulations of this kind.

Succeeding in small business is challenge enough in the state of Maine. For over 60 years we have managed to sustain and grow a family-owned business which is valued by our customers and supports three generations of our family as well as valued employees.

We have always grown something – from poultry to peppers to petunias. Petunias are “agriculture” as much as other crops and should be fairly treated as such by the Maine state government.

Thomas A. Estabrook

On behalf of the Estabrook family

Estabrook’s Garden Centers

Yarmouth, Scarborough and Kennebunk

Editorial misses mark on Tree Growth Law

It is unfortunate that managing editor, Ben Bragdon, chooses to write an editorial about the Tree Growth Tax Law, (“Time to Fix Loophole in Tree-Growth Law,” April 6, 2012) when he clearly does not understand it and apparently has done a very poor job of researching it. His flawed article focuses on the “loophole” in the law, where he describes lack of oversight pertaining to the forest management plan. He states, “The problem, according to critics of the program, is that there is no one watching to see if landowners are actually following through on their promise to manage their woodlands, which comes with as much as a 95 percent tax reduction.” Nowhere in the article does he mention the involvement of a Maine Licensed Forester, the person most central to the functioning of the Tree Growth Tax Law.

As for watching to see if landowners are in compliance, Editor Ben Bragdon fails to note a Maine licensed forester must either prepare the forest management plan, or sign off on a landowner prepared plan. By law, the property has to be inspected every ten years by a Maine Licensed forester for compliance. Beyond that, any municipal tax assessor has the law enforced ability to view the landowners Forest Management plan, and involve Maine Forest Service Foresters in evaluating the landowners’ performance. Licensed foresters that do not follow Tree Growth Tax law rules jeopardize their license.

In spite of what Editor Bragdon has written, there are no loopholes in the oversight of the Tree Growth Tax Law. It is my opinion that he has so mischaracterized many of the concepts in his article that its information is nearly useless.

Gregory E. Foster

Licensed Professional

Forester

Raymond

School board article misleading

I was very disappointed to read the misleading headline and sensationalized story by Duke Harrington (School budget clash looming in South Portland, Current, April 11, 2012) regarding the South Portland school board’s workshop on Monday evening.

I believe Mr. Harrington intentionally took statements out of context to create the impression of a “clash looming” between the school board and the City Council. Certainly, his photograph of school board member Richard Matthews standing while making his statements invokes the image of an angry board member. What Mr. Harrington failed to note, however, is that Mr. Matthews was standing because of a sore back – a point Mr. Matthews made quite clear during the meeting.

The remainder of Mr. Harrington’s article is similarly off the mark in both its characterization of what the city councilors conveyed to the school board at an earlier meeting, and what the school board members discussed among themselves at the workshop. A review of the video from the City Council meeting clearly shows councilors asking the school board to review the budget again and look for possible reductions on the school side of the city budget just as the councilors would do the same on the municipal side.

Contrary to Mr. Harrington’s implications, however, the City Council did not issue a directive or order to make cuts that the school board is now defying. Likewise, the school board is not taking a “hardline tone” nor is it “refusing to put anything on the table” as Mr. Harrington suggests. The board went through an exhaustive budget process resulting in a proposed 2.2 percent increase over previous year operational spending, due almost entirely to increases in the costs of providing the same level of services, but also with some cuts and some positions restored from previous cuts where it has become clear that the prior cuts are causing – and will continue to cause – difficulties in meeting the needs of South Portland students.

The sentiment at the school board budget workshop, as expressed by each of the six board members present, was that the board could not recommend any further cuts without adversely affecting educational programming, and that the board was prepared to make the case for the budget at the proposed 2.2 percent increase at the upcoming joint workshop with the City Council. This is hardly the “school budget clash” envisioned by Mr. Harrington. The relationship between the school board and the City Council has improved greatly in the past year, and it is extremely inappropriate for Mr. Harrington to jeopardize those gains for the sake of sensational “journalism.”

Jeff Selser

South Portland

Board of Education