"owners of luxury vehicles including Ferraris and Lamborghinis got away with paying a fraction of what they owed, costing municipalities millions of dollars."
While the average taxpayer in this state is getting reamed but good!!!!
"Audit finds failings at Registry; Scores of violators allowed to drive" by John C. Drake, Globe Staff | July 10, 2008
The Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles allowed thousands of repeat drunk drivers, chronic speeders, and even motorists convicted of vehicular homicide to stay on the road despite judges' orders that they lose their driving privileges, according to a report by the state auditor released yesterday.
The audit also found that Registry officials failed in another key area: auto excise taxes. The auditors said owners of luxury vehicles including Ferraris and Lamborghinis got away with paying a fraction of what they owed, costing municipalities millions of dollars.
The review by state Auditor Joseph DeNucci's office said that for at least two years, owners of some fancy cars were drastically underbilled for their auto excise taxes, causing Massachusetts communities to lose out on millions in revenues. The audit did not contain a specific estimate of the losses.
Since some luxury cars do not have assigned values in the Kelley Blue Book, a common guide on auto values, an automated Registry system assigned them a default value of $17,000 in 2003 and 2004. That means the owner of a new Maserati with a sale value of $325,000 paid taxes of $382.50, instead of the $7,312 the owner otherwise would have paid, according to the audit.
Then from 2005 to 2007, owners of vehicles without assigned values were sent no excise tax bills at all. The problem also applied to many large trucks, buses, and custom campers that could have values up to $1.5 million.
"The owners of these types of vehicles haven't been paying close to their fair share of auto excise taxes," DeNucci said.
Kaprielian said the problem was discovered last year. She said vehicle owners who received no bills at all have been sent bills to cover all three years. But the Registry cannot send new bills to exotic car owners who underpaid, because of state rules, she said.
"If they had paid, the Department of Revenue bars us from collecting again," Kaprielian said. "It's always something we need to be aware of, making sure owners of obscure luxury cars are being assessed at their value."
Governor Deval Patrick launched a statewide initiative yesterday to find ways to integrate immigrants into Massachusetts "as quickly as possible" at a time when their numbers are booming.
The New Americans Initiative, modeled after a similar approach in Illinois, calls on state officials, policy advisers, and advocates to hold a series of public meetings across the state and draft a report with policy recommendations by July 1, 2009. The Illinois effort led to expanded English classes and other services.
And WHO is going to PAY for this?!
Not the guys driving the luxury cars, obviously!!!!
In fact, they are the ones who are probably using the illegal labor that is coming with them
Patrick's approach comes at a time when immigrants' influence on Massachusetts' workforce, population, and schools is at its highest since the 1950s. About 14 percent of the state's residents are immigrants, and their presence in the workforce has doubled since 1980 to 17 percent. But they face serious challenges: More than 20 percent are not fluent in English, and studies have shown that most are ill-prepared for the state's changing economy.
So are our OWN KIDS while you assholes toss money at rich Hollywood folk or corporate and lottery favorites, or Wall Street.
And NOW THIS!!!
Massachusetts officials expect wide-ranging testimony at the public meetings, from the hurdles that immigrants face as they assimilate and find jobs, to the impact on cities and towns. The meetings will be organized by the governor's Ad visory Council on Refugees and Immigrants; the Office for Refugees and Immigrants; and the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, the state's largest advocacy group.
"Massachusetts is and has always been a Commonwealth of immigrants," Patrick said in a statement yesterday after he signed an executive order creating the initiative.
That seems a little dictataorial, no? Party on, guv!
He is expected to speak publicly on the issue today at a naturalization ceremony in Faneuil Hall. "Although immigration reform and enforcement is a federal issue, today's reality is that states can and must find creative ways to better integrate immigrant and refugee populations through more coordinated services, including English language classes, job training, and citizenship assistance."
The governor's order drew swift rebuke from a group in Framingham that opposes illegal immigration for failing to distinguish between legal and illegal immigrants.
"They're just going to put everybody in one pot and call them all immigrants, which is not right," said Jim Rizoli, director of Concerned Citizens and Friends of Illegal Immigration Law Enforcement. "It's great that they do whatever they can to help legal immigrants in the state, but I'm not for putting any of our taxpayers' money into anything that deals with illegal immigrants because they're breaking the law. I don't understand how they can do that with a good conscience."
Yeah, and NEITHER DOES the Boston Globe here for anyone who has been reading my posts on this issue!!!
They NEVER DISTINGUISH until they are FORCED TO, so FUCK OFF, New World Order Agenda-Pushers!!!!!!
Richard Chacón, executive director of the Office for Refugees and Immigrants, said he expected that illegal immigration issues would come up at the meetings.
"There are going to be times when there's going to be very frank and probably some uncomfortable conversations that we'll have in different parts of the state," he said. "It's a necessity if we're going to come up with a meaningful plan for our refugees and immigrants and for our cities and towns."
Of the 907,000 immigrants in Massachusetts, about 175,000 are here illegally, according to a report by the Massachusetts Institute for a New Commonwealth, a nonpartisan think-tank, along with the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University.
The Massachusetts initiative reflects the starkly different approaches that individual states are taking toward immigrants across the nation. Illinois and Rhode Island, states that have similar percentages of foreign-born residents as Massachusetts, are examples to the contrast.
Yeah, our state is an amnesty state -- and now the good guv wants us to pick up the tabs for them while our cities rot!
Here, you can start with New Bedford (see post below)!
In Illinois, the governor issued a 2005 executive order with a similar name and approach as Patrick's to draft policy recommendations on integrating immigrants. One result: The state opened the Illinois Welcoming Center near Chicago, a one-stop shop for incorporating immigrants.
But in Rhode Island, Governor Donald Carcieri recently signed an executive order demanding that the State Police, prisons, and other agencies help the federal government be more aware on illegal immigration.
"States are not pursuing a one-size-fits-all solution," said Dirk Hegen, a policy associate at the Washington-based National Conference of State Legislatures, which tracks state legislation nationwide. "They come up with their own solutions."
Patrick's effort is so far funded with about $200,000 in private donations from the Carnegie Foundation, the Barr Foundation, the Bob Stewart Hildreth Charitable Foundation, and Partners HealthCare, Chacón said.
No doubt globalist agenda pushers all; Mass. is making quite a laboratory for them these days, what with the gay crap, too.
Patrick has grappled with the immigration issue since he took office last year. He overturned Governor Mitt Romney's executive order allowing state troopers to aid federal immigration agents and ordered the state's prisons to screen for illegal immigrants so that they could be subject to deportation.
I never thought I would say this, but I want Romney back.
