Phase out LGA, says Freedom Foundation
The Freedom Foundation of Minnesota (FFM) was at the Capitol today (June 16) selling their proposal to phase-out local government aid (LGA).
Annette Meeks, the right-leaning FFM executive director and others, argues that cities can’t count on LGA, lawmakers can’t control it, and taxpayers can’t afford it.
Over the past 20 years, state general fund spending has tripled to its current $34.6 billion.
The state spends too much, argues the report.
The report argues that the LGA funding formula, which takes into account vehicle accidents per capitia, household size, is an improvement over grandfathering and built-in inflation factors, it hasn’t reigned in LGA funding.
Nor has LGA curb property tax increases, the report argues.
In this decade alone, property taxes in the state have increased almost 68 percent, according to the report.
Additionally, the report argues that many taxpayers, for their tax dollars spent on LGA, get nothing back.
Ninety-one cities with a combined population of over a million people get no LGA funding at all.
The FFM recommends LGA be phased out over time.
It also recommends that state mandates related to local government spending be lifted — no more property tax caps, no more maintenance of effort requirments.
LGA was created in 1971.
