Gov. Mike Pence isn’t likely to pin this one up on the walls of his new Statehouse office, but at least he received a courtesy debate Tuesday on his call for a state income tax cut.
Pence already was shut out of the first version of a $30 billion, two-year budget developed by Indiana House Republicans. Rep. Tim Brown, a Crawfordsville Republican and House Ways and Means Committee chairman, didn’t rule out Pence’s wish. But on Tuesday, the Ways and Means Committee sent the budget to the full House with only a hint from Brown that there was still time to let the income tax cut idea percolate. Wait, he said, until the all-revealing April revenue forecast — the final one before the budget has to be out the door.
Still, while GOP legislators’ mouths were saying maybe, their body language was saying no.
Also on Tuesday, senators from Pence’s party talked over the concept during a Senate Tax and Fiscal Policy Committee, even as they shared doubts that Indiana could afford to make the cut now. With the state trying to recover cuts made to education and catch up on infrastructure repairs, the senators’ reluctance is wise.
The discussion then meandered: What tax, if any, is worth rolling back in Indiana?
If anything, Pence’s proposed 10 percent cut to the state’s income tax — something that would keep roughly $770 million in workers’ pockets over the next two years — kept the conversation moving. Maybe that is a victory.
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