Kaufman: Tax incentive rollbacks preferable to casinos

Kaufman: Tax incentive rollbacks preferable to casinos

Lexington - As House leaders ready a gambling bill, former Gov. Michael Dukakis slammed casino gambling Tuesday as "lousy" and said lawmakers would be better off repealing "worthless" tax incentives he says could be redirected to boost the state economy.

"If Massachusetts decides that more gambling is the way to pay for the services we need, I am confident that every other New England state, not just Connecticut and Rhode Island, will follow suit, and the hoped for money will be minimal at best," Dukakis said in an email to the News Service. "We have enough addiction in our society. We don't need 100,000 more gambling addicts to add to the problem."

Dukakis said repealing "all or some" of about $2 billion in longstanding tax breaks could help "put people to work and create the foundation for a healthy future economy."

He and his wife, Kitty, along with former Attorney General Scott Harshbarger, plan to keynote a Thursday forum to lay out gambling opponents' case against bringing slot machines and casinos to Massachusetts. Opponents, facing a surge of interest in expanded gambling within the Legislature, met Monday afternoon with Gov. Deval Patrick, who last session led a failed push for resort casinos.

Dukakis isn't alone in his call to repeal some of the state's billions of dollars in tax exemptions, deductions and credits doled out each year. Human service advocates have argued that some exemptions are outdated and could be applied to services for the needy that have faced cuts in the down economy.

The Legislature's Revenue Committee has set up a subcommittee to examine the state's 60 pages of exemptions and credits and co-chair Rep. Jay Jaufman hopes to have a preliminary report out in January.

"The only conclusion that I've drawn so far is that over time, that list of exemptions and deductions looks pretty ad hoc," the Lexington Democrat said. "It's hard to figure out what the rationale is for many of them. What we're trying to do is establish some policy around those. We're sort of two steps removed from having a set of recommendations. We don't yet have the criteria and we don't yet have an analysis."

Kaufman said he doesn't believe expanded gambling is "a particularly sound, sustainable way to raise money for the state."

"I think it's even worse when considered as an economic development strategy," he said. "I certainly think we have to look elsewhere for any kind of additional revenues."

But legislative leaders have signaled a growing consensus that expanded gambling is likely, if not "inevitable" - as Senate President Therese Murray dubbed it earlier this year. Proponents cite the potential to create thousands of permanent and construction jobs and raise hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue for the state. They also argue that Massachusetts residents are already traveling to Connecticut to gamble, returning with addiction issues but generating no revenue for the commonwealth.

Patrick, who in 2008 threw the weight of his administration - and much of the political capital with which he swept into office - behind a failed push to build three resort casinos, has appeared cooler to expanded gambling proposals than he once was. In recent interviews, he has emphasized the "human costs" and his top economic development aide said last week the administration would let the Legislature take the lead on any gambling push this session.

According to the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, Massachusetts will forfeit $1.7 billion in corporate, income and sales taxes in the form of tax breaks this fiscal year, an amount that exceeds the state higher education budget.

"One of the big problems is that we have very little data or information about most of the tax expenditures," said budget and policy center executive director Noah Berger. "There's just not information about what we're accomplishing."

Breaks include a $123.1 million exemption on container purchases, a $70.7 million small business corporation income tax break, a $78 million film tax credit, a $25 million life sciences credit, as well as dozens of other credits and exemptions affecting brownfields, medical devices, rental housing, research and development, aircraft parts, student loan interest and fuel for vessels engaged in interstate commerce.