SIMMONS: D.C.’s incentive for teachers to live in city is a good idea

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Amid a flurry of legislative activity on Tuesday, approval of a $9.4 billion spending plan for the District’s 2013 fiscal year was an encouraging piece of tax legislation.

Introduced by D.C. Council member Vincent B. Orange, the Public School Teachers Income Exclusion Act proposes granting tax breaks to teachers who work for D.C. public schools and live in the city. The only major caveat appears to be that a teacher must have taught a full academic year to become eligible.

Such a mandate seems reasonable when compared with other D.C. tax breaks, such as the D.C. homestead deduction, which grants property-tax breaks to homeowners who own and reside in homes in the District, and the first-time D.C. homebuyer credit, a federal deduction that mandates new homeowners stay in their homes for five years.

The teachers tax legislation is encouraging for a couple of reasons, chief among them that the tax break likely will mean teachers will be fully invested in the city’s education system and not merely collecting a paycheck to pay union dues.

As things stand now, when most D.C. public school educators and coaches leave our schoolhouses, their paychecks go with them to Maryland and Virginia.

These educators don’t have to worry about whether Jose and Keisha have learned a doggone thing. After all, they aren’t neighbors, and they don’t have to fret about whether their own children will mix with the wrong, uneducated crowd.

Mr. Orange’s legislation is important for another reason, too.

Holier-than-thou types generally don’t like measures such as this, and I’m not referring to truly good Samaritans.

I mean the safety-net advocates who cry a river about lost revenue every time phrases like “tax cut,” “tax credit,” “tax break” or “tax relief” are embedded in a piece of legislation.

It’s OK for poverty pimps to make a name for themselves for the sake of poor people. But ask them to support a measure that gives a break to folks whose income is above the poverty line, and they act as though they are being gagged by a silver spoon engraved with Queen Elizabeth’s family crest.

Take the very liberal D.C. Fiscal Policy Institute (DCFPI) by way of example.

In 2005, when the city first embraced legislation that would grant a tax break for D.C. teachers, DCFPI’s Ed Lazere raised both eyebrows.

First he questioned why nurses, librarians and the like weren’t receiving special treatment, too.

Then he questioned whether pocketbook issues were the real reason more teachers live in other jurisdictions.

Up next?

Why, lost revenue, of course.

“The revenue loss would make it harder to make public investments in things like libraries, roads and parks that enhance the quality of life in the District and are critical to attracting and retaining residents,” Mr. Lazere stated in his 2005 public testimony.

Still later, he played the 1 percent card, saying that he “would hope that tax relief would address the regressive features of our tax system and would target relief to address pressing needs. The District could consider, for example, revising its outdated property tax credit for low-income residents or expanding the D.C. [Earned Income Tax Credit].”

C’mon, man.

Liberals, progressives and socialists want you to think any hardworking family with a six-figure salary ought to pay higher taxes.

Never mind that there’s never a plea for government to cut spending.

Never mind that those families are paying college tuitions; living in nickel-and-dime-’em D.C.; and have rents, mortgages, car notes and other high cost-of-living rates to pay.

Never mind that teachers who live where they work would add to the D.C. tax rolls in other ways.

Sure, the tax break will cost.

In fact, in 2005, the District’s chief financial officer estimated that a tax break for teachers would have cost an estimated $8.5 million in 2005 and $9.5 million three years later.

The District is hardly flush with cash, but giving schoolteachers a cash incentive to live in the city is a smart approach to bolstering tax rolls — and gives educators a vested interest inside and outside the classroom.

• Deborah Simmons can be reached at dsimmonsatwashingtontimes.com.