The Problem with Proposition 1 - by Paul Bettencourt

All Houstonians will see at nearly the end of their long Election Day Ballot, is one simple statement about establishing a dedicated Drainage Fund and a Fee associated with it called Proposition 1. What this hides for most City of Houston Voters is that Prop 1 is a massive new property tax that will charge even our Churches, Schools, and Charities, plus it does not provide any exemptions for our over 65 Senior Homeowners. As a former "Taxman", let me urge you to vote against Prop 1 while explaining the real problems with Prop 1.

In all my years in public service to taxpayers, I have never seen a proposal that is a MINIMUM tax or fee before reading the Prop 1 petition you won't see on the ballot. Prop 1 sets a minimum amount, $125 Million dollars of revenue collections to the city in 2012, and then mandates the City Council to set the drainage charges to collect it in FULL. Prop 1 supporters have talked about this fund being as much as $300 to $400 million dollars a year in size which is so large that it is 35% to 47% the size of all property tax collections in the City of Houston each year. It will collect 8 Billion dollars in 20 years  

This new fee is really a property tax based upon proposed rates...

(Click here to download church bulletin inserts and/or fact sheet on Houston Proposition 1)

In the Houston, Texas area, a group of volunteer citizens called True The Vote, headed by Catherine Engelbrecht, has uncovered what appears to be vote fraud on an enormous scale. This scandal, if it spreads nationally, has the potential to be the biggest scandal in American elections in decades.

In November of 2009, Catherine Engelbrecht and about 50 of her friends decided to get involved by working at the polls in elections. What they saw regarding lackadaisical attention to procedures at the polls greatly disturbed them. But even they weren't ready for what they discovered after they decided to dig deeper into the problem by looking at the voter registration rolls.

Engelbrecht and her friends initially used computers to analyze voter registration lists. They became curious when they noticed that a large number of voter registrations were from addresses that had more than six registered voters. Their analysis showed about 2,800 such voter registrations per district in Republican areas and 7,500 in Democrat voting districts. Such a large discrepancy between Republican and Democratic households seemed a little suspicious considering Democrats are typically far more likely to be in favor of abortion and small families than Republicans. But the real shock occurred when they came across one voting district with approximately 20,000 such voter registrations. It was in a predominantly minority area in Houston. Of course, once the results were publicized, allegations arose that Engelbrecht's group was guilty of targeting minorities, but Engelbrecht stuck to her guns and said, "It had nothing to do with politics. It was just the numbers."

The deeper they dug, the more they found. They found....

The following bulletin insert is available at no cost to churches who request copies - please let us know as quickly as possible if and how many you would need!  Please email your quantity and church information to info@uspastorcouncil.org! 

Over 70 pastors from all corners of Houston gathered for a lunch briefing on Houston Proposition 1 at Massa's Seafood Grill in downtown on October 14.  Speakers included city councilman Michael Sullivan, former county tax assessor/collector Paul Bettencourt, businessman and leader of StopProp1.com Norman Adams and Bob Jones representing Renew Houston, sponsors of Prop 1.

(Pastor Steve Riggle moderating with Prop 1 supporter Bob Jones)

The dialogue was lively and even heated a few times as the evidence mounted that the sponsors of this measure had neglected to talk to anyone from the church community while drafting the measure and had intentionally included churches, schools and non-profits in the new "fee" (de facto property tax) because they should "pay their fair share".  The drastic impact on churches budgets already struggling in a down economy was apparently lost on the contractors, engineers and politicans promoting this measure - which has NO rates or maximum revenues anywhere in its language.

(City Councilman Michael Sullivan answering questions about Prop 1 (left)....Explaining problems with the ballot measure (right)

A press conference was held after the lunch where about 30 of the pastors participated in sending a strong "No!" message that was covered on several of the major network stations.  The coverage can be found at:

http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/video?id=7725456&syndicate=syndicate§ion=

http://www.click2houston.com/video/25395548/?taf=hou

For all the information you need about this attack on the tax exempt status of churches, please go to www.stopprop1.com and www.uspastorcouncil.org/Events_Issues