Makeup break

The gonifs at Metro, the Extra Layer of Government You Didn't Know You Needed®, have decided not to go to the voters in May to ask for an extension and "tweak" of its economy-sapping homeless "services" income tax, imposed on upper-middle-class and rich people. Now they're talking about a ballot measure in November.

As I recall, the tax is with us until 2030, even without another vote. But apparently the scoundrels want to change the rules so that the tax money can flow directly to the apartment bunker developer weasels. Classic Portland. Apparently that will have to wait, at least another half year.

It's interesting that the Metro bobbleheads don't want a public vote on the proposal right now. That's a sure sign that the pollsters have told them it might fail. And so they need some more time to doll it up and blow more smoke around the blatant, fundamental failures of the tax.

When Portland's progressive tax-lovers foolishly put this gouge before the electorate initially, the idea for a lot of voters was that it would help get the creeps and junkies off the streets. We're something like a billion dollars into the tax now (not an exaggeration), and it hasn't done squat in that regard. When you dig down a little, you learn that a lot of the money's been going to "prevent" homelessness – in other words, to give an increased welfare check to people who currently have a roof over their heads. That might not be a bad idea, but it's not what was being pitched at the outset. 

And of course, a lot of the dough goes to pay the mortgages of countless "executive directors" of politically connected "nonprofit community partners." Getting the tent people into shelters hasn't really been part of the program. Maybe the voters have noticed.

There's got to be some serious buyer's remorse on the part of the Subaru suburbanites who fell for this. They're still stepping in bum doo on the walk from the garage to the symphony. But I doubt the "homeless" tax will ever go away. When I gripe about Portland and say I'm going to move because of the taxes, people ask where to, Lake Oswego? And I always tell them heck no, out of Oregon entirely.