Utah state senators advanced legislation Monday putting an amendment to the state Constitution on the November ballot that would require 60% voter approval for passing initiatives that raise taxes.
The Senate Revenue and Taxation Committee sent first HB284 and then HJR14 to the full Senate on a split vote, with Republican Sens. Curt Bramble of Provo and Wayne Harper of Taylorsville joining Senate Minority Leader Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City, in opposition.
During Monday’s Senate hearing, Bramble, who was serving as the committee’s acting chairman during the debate, repeatedly pressed the sponsor of both the bill and the resolution, Rep. Jason Kyle, R-Huntsville, about how a tax increase was being defined.
For example, Bramble asked, since the term tax can mean imposing a “financial burden” on citizens, would an initiative expanding the current sales tax base to include services be considered an increase since that might “double, triple or quadruple” revenues?
Kyle initially said an initiative would have to raise an existing tax or implement a new one to be subject to the threshold. Later, he said if an “initiative is asking for something to be taxed that has not been taxed before, that’s probably a new tax” since “it’s not taxed already.”
He described HB284, which would implement the constitutional amendment in the resolution if it is approved by voters, as a “tax bill. It’s dealing with taxes. We do not address any other type of voter initiative.”
The 60% approval that would be required to pass initiatives that raise taxes was chosen because “it’s not an insurmountable threshold. It’s very achievable,” Kyle said. “We’d like to have that overwhelming support at the state when those things come on our ballots.”
Voters “will be able to choose,” he said, whether the threshold should be increased.
Kyle was joined in his presentation by the Utah Taxpayers Association’s Rusty Cannon. Cannon noted the legislation was “drafted generally, with the idea to try to capture as much as possible. If more clarity would help, we’re certainly completely open to that.”
Cannon told the committee that the increased threshold would “put a check” on out-of-state interest groups that fund initiatives, citing a Washington, D.C., organization he said helped fund the successful 2018 Medicaid expansion initiative that raised sales taxes.
“We encourage you to protect Utah taxpayers,” Cannon said.
Opponents of the legislation, including the “Let Utah Vote” coalition that’s described as “dedicated to protecting and progressing the right to vote in Utah,” have pointed out the Medicaid expansion initiative was approved with less than a 60% majority of votes.
Kyle saw similar legislation fail in the Senate in the final days of the 2023 Legislature. Friday, Senate Majority Leader Evan Vickers, R-Cedar City, raised concerns about ballot “clutter,” given that there are already several other proposed amendments set to go before voters.
Voters could end up “just automatically saying no to everything,” Vickers said, a scenario that would include rejecting an amendment sought by lawmakers that would allow them to spend state income taxes on more than education and some social services programs.