In 2004, the Globe wrote about people who live in Boston but, in violation of state law, register their cars in other states. They evade Boston's excise tax, state safety inspections, and state registration fees. According to the Globe story, in 1997 "the state's inspector general declared that cities and towns and the Commonwealth were losing millions each year to cheats who took advantage of lower insurance premiums by registering their cars out of state".
City Councilor Rob Consalvo of Hyde Park seemed intent on doing something about this 4 years ago, but according to a letter from a Brighton resident that was the subject of this GlobeWatch column in today's Globe, the City and State are still unable to collect these millions of dollars that are literally sitting on our streets waiting to be collected. As the City and State are both about to make major budget cuts in response to declining revenues, it is time for our government to figure out how to collect this money that it is due.
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How about lowering taxes and getting rid of inspections? People wouldn't do this if MA wasn't so out of line with the rest of the country. I think we were the last state to not have competitive insurance rates.
ReplyDeleteSettling for 50 cents on the dollar by lowering taxes is better than the massive cost of enforcement, which will be an utter failure anyway.