Studer Community Institute

Claimbake: Mike Hill edition

October 23, 2014
/ Joe Vinson
/ community-dashboard

Welcome to the first installment of Claimbake, a recurring feature on Pensacola Today where we will look at claims made by politicians and public officials, parse the meaning behind the words and separate the spin from the truth. Only specific claims will be evaluated. Claims will be judged on a scale from “Fresh” to “Deep Fried.” [sidebar] Claimbake Ratings:

Fresh: The claim is accurate and presented with appropriate context.
Mostly Fresh: The claim is mostly accurate, but some relevant details are omitted or obfuscated.
Breaded: The claim is technically true, but omits important context or key details.
Fried: The claim misrepresents facts to give an impression that is largely false.
Deep Fried: The claim is completely false and presented in bad faith.

[/sidebar] With less than two weeks till Election Day, it’s a veritable claim smorgasbord as citizens’ mailboxes are bombarded with mailers from incumbents bragging about their records and challengers hoping to impress. First up on the Claimbake menu: State Rep. Mike Hill, who is seeking re-election to the District 2 seat he won in last June’s special election following the death of State Rep. Clay Ford.

Claim: Hill “voted to balance Florida’s budget”

This is a major theme in several of Hill’s campaign materials, and it’s accurate to say, as one mailer does, that Hill “voted yes on a balanced budget.” He could have voted no on HB 5003, which implemented the 2014-2015 General Appropriations Act. However, there is no way that Hill could have voted for a budget that was not balanced, because the legislature is constitutionally required to pass a balanced budget. Since a deficit budget was never possible, the claim is misleading. Claim status: Breaded

Claim: Hill voted to “pay down $3.6 billion in debt”

While Florida is required to have a balanced budget every year, it is possible for the state to incur debt through capital spending, such as building roads or university buildings, or purchasing land for environmental preservation. Gov. Rick Scott has been touting the $4 billion reduction of Florida’s total outstanding debt since he took office, from $28.2 billion in 2010 to $24.2 billion this year. So where does the $3.6 billion figure come from? It seems to have been lifted from the talking points of Scott’s proposed “It’s Your Money Tax Cut Budget” released back in January:

Over the past three years we have laid a foundation of reforms to cut taxes, pay down debt and reduce spending. These pro-growth policies supported the creation of more than 462,000 private sector jobs in our state, and our vibrant economy led to a major drop in our unemployment rate – now below the national average at 6.2 percent. Nearly 3,000 state regulations on families and job creators have been repealed and we have paid down $3.6 billion in state debt.

Notice that the claimed $3.6 billion is the cumulative reduction of the three previous years, 2010-2013. Hill only has one legislative session under his belt, the 2014 session. The difference between the two numbers, $400 million, is how much the governor’s office says was paid down in this year’s budget. That’s the only number Hill could reasonably take credit for. One of Hill’s mailers correctly refers to paying down “hundreds of millions in debt,” while two others use the $3.6 billion figure. Claim status: Fried

Claim: “Sponsored a bill to reduce Florida’s vehicle license fees by $400 million”

Rep. Hill was the primary sponsor of House Bill 61, “Motor Vehicle License Taxes,” which would have amended section 320 of the Florida statutes to reduce vehicle registration service charges from $5 to $2.50; reduced license plate decal service charges from $3 to $1; reduced the fee for retroreflective materials on license plates and stickers from $1.50 to $0.50; reduced the license tax surcharge from $4 to $2; and reduced a surcharge related to juvenile crime prevention programs from $5.50 to $1. Hill’s bill died in the Finance & Tax Subcommittee. However, Hill co-sponsored a similar bill rolling back vehicle registration fees (HB 7123) that eventually merged with a companion bill (SB 156) and was approved. It went into effect last month. According to a staff analysis, the law will have a total negative recurring impact of $394.6 million. That’s the $400 million Hill refers to. The problem arises when Hill conflates the bill he sponsored with the one that passed. There was no impact analysis of Hill’s original bill, but his proposed fee rollbacks add up to $12 per vehicle. The bill that passed included additional license fee rollbacks based on the type and weight of vehicle. (Small car owners, for example, now pay $5 less per year, while large truck owners pay $11.50 less per year.) Without those license fee rollbacks, the impact of Hill’s bill would have been considerably less than $400 million. Ultimately it’s only the difference between “sponsoring” and “co-sponsoring” a bill, but the difference exists. Claim status: Mostly Fresh

Claim: “Voted to cut our taxes by $500 million — Florida’s largest ever tax cut.”

During the 2014 legislative session, Florida lawmakers passed a budget that included $500 million in “tax relief.” Most of that was in the form of the aforementioned vehicle fee rollbacks. The remaining $105 million was in the form of four sales tax holidays and other sales tax exemptions. Hill supported this budget. So far, so good. If the claim had stopped there it would have been fresh. Alas! One of Hill’s mailers tacked on a phrase describing the $500 million relief as “Florida’s largest ever tax cut.” Superlative claims demand extra scrutiny, and this one isn’t even close to being true. The title “Florida’s largest tax cut” has been bandied about by many politicians over the years. Governors Jeb Bush and Charlie Crist both claimed to have saved taxpayers over $1 billion in a single year's budget — more than double the $500 million relief in the 2014 budget — but they’re all dwarfed by Save Our Homes, which saves Florida homeowners billions of dollars every year. Claim status without “largest ever tax cut”: Fresh Claim status with “largest ever tax cut”: Fried

Claim: “Opposed taxpayer-subsidized in-state tuition rates for illegal immigrants”

House Bill 851, “Postsecondary Education Tuition and Fees,” waives out-of-state tuition fees for students “who are undocumented for federal immigration purposes” if they meet certain requirements, such as attending a Florida high school for three years. The bill passed and was signed into law by Scott, but Hill voted against it. Claim status: Fresh

Claim: “Co-sponsored a bill to let military veterans and active duty service members attend Florida universities at in-state tuition rates.”

Hill co-sponsored House Bill 35, “Resident Status for Tuition Purposes,” which would have allowed allowed military veterans and reserve personnel to qualify as Florida residents for tuition purposes. It was withdrawn prior to introduction, but a companion bill, HB 7015, passed unanimously in both houses. Claim status: Fresh

Claim: “Mike co-sponsored a bill to give tax incentives to local businesses that hire veterans and disabled veterans.”

Hill co-sponsored House Bill 249, “Corporate Income Tax,” which would have established a tax credit worth $5,000 for hiring a veteran or $10,000 for hiring a disabled veteran. The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Matt Gaetz, withdrew the bill prior to introduction. A similar bill, SB 110, would have created the “Florida Veterans Employment Act” that fulfilled the same goal, but it died in the Appropriations Subcommittee on Finance and Tax. It’s not unusual for bills to be combined with or superseded by others that serve a similar purpose, and it’s reasonable for a lawmaker to want to take some credit for an achievement that someone else moved past the goal. In this instance, however, neither HB 249 nor SB 110 became law. Hill’s mailer is accurately worded, but a reader might infer that the tax incentive had passed when it did not. Claim status: Mostly Fresh

Claim: “Co-sponsored legislation demanding that Congress pass a balanced budget.”

Hill co-sponsored House Memorial 625, “applying to Congress to call a convention for the sole purpose of proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States that requires a balanced federal budget.” It was laid on the table in favor of a similar memorial, SM 658, which was adopted. Claim status: Fresh

Claim: “Florida’s unemployment rate has fallen from 11.2% in November 2010 to 6.2% in June 2014.”

True, but of questionable relevance in a political ad for someone who was elected in June 2013. Claim status: Breaded Have you received a political mailer you'd like us to evaluate? Scan or photograph it and email to [email text="Joe Vinson"][email protected][/email]. We'll cover as many as we can before election day.

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