Members of Americans for Prosperity (AFP) – Tennessee this week said they were disappointed that Mayor John Cooper referred to the Nashville Taxpayer Protection Act as a “poison pill.”
AFP members said this in a press release.
The Nashville Taxpayer Protection Act would roll back Cooper’s 34-37 percent tax increase and limit property tax rate increases to two percent every year without approval by a vote of the people. This past week, AFP submitted nearly 20,000 signatures to the Metro Council supporting the Nashville Taxpayer Protection Act.
In the press release, AFP-TN State Director Tori Venable said the following:
“There’s nothing stealth about giving Nashvillians the ability to decide whether they want to increase their own taxes. The Nashville Taxpayer Protection Act will stop the sweetheart crony deals that are bleeding Nashville dry, limit government’s ability to recklessly spend taxpayer dollars, and stop this massive tax hike that Nashvillians cannot afford,” Venable said.
“The only ‘poison pill’ is the harmful tax increase Nashville families and businesses are being forced to swallow while politicians and politically connected companies cash in on the backs of taxpayers. The buck stops here. We look forward to people standing up to fight city hall, making their voice heard across our once thriving city and enacting this charter amendment in December.”
As The Tennessee Star reported this week, Cooper, at a press conference, said he expected that the topic of the referendum “will be actively discussed in the community.”
“Ultimately, I do worry that the result of this is just forcing a stealth election on Nashville, a very expensive stealth election on Nashville, in order to give the city a poison pill. And it’s not just about the property taxes, it has all kinds of stuff on it that is, quite frankly, a poison pill for our city,” Cooper said, although he did not elaborate.
“Everyone who serves the city, every teacher, every police officer, [and] every citizen of the city would need to be deeply concerned that this is a poison pill. We want to create a great city — going forward in the 21st century — and not create a backwater here and have us swallow, unintentionally, a poison pill, particularly through a stealth election.”
As reported last week, Nashville attorney Jim Roberts said that Metro officials “clearly don’t like having power taken away.”
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Mayor John Cooper” by nashville.gov.
Huh. It was like you didn’t jump into the race after Carol Swain jumped in just to steal the Republican vote. #hypocrite
Cooper’s poison pill comment was delivered to the citizenry in his typical monotone, arrogant, and condescending tone. His childish spoiled brat antics to certain business thru the scamdemic equals the ignorance of the poison pill comment, he is the king and should never be questioned, jerk. VOTE to stop the tax increase and Cooper can place his tax increase where the sun don’t shine! Stop this power crazed nut!
Sumner County residents need to start a petition to roll back the outlandish tax increases caused by runway spending of the county power brokers.
$500K for a start at salvaging a falling apart barn is only the beginning.
If the citizens knew of the deals that have been made they would not believe it. Its not just this present administration other groups are involved also, this goes way back, the Nashville swamp is real and democrat controlled. The decisions made are NOT for the benefit of the citizens, no matter what their media (2, 4, 5 and The Tennessean) will tell you. The powers that are in control in Nashville are the reason no one but, a Democrat can be elected. Its all about CONTROL for the powerful. There are power brokers in this town that run everything. As John said “JUST VOTE”. Take away their money and TAKE AWAY THEIR POWER! “JUST VOTE” !
Just vote.