Cutting tax deduction didn't sit well with Catholics

DAN MEYER

Political Columnist File this latest observation and analysis of New York's state budget under the category of "never underestimate the power of."

In this case, we have a religious organization using an advanced form of technology to make it crystal clear to our elected officials in Albany how it feels about the proposed tuition tax deduction that was pitched by Gov. Eliot Spitzer.

The state's spending plan for 2007-08 cut Spitzer's proposal to include a $1,000 tuition tax deduction intended for parents with children in independent, religious, or out-of-district public schools.

While the State Senate strongly supported and fought for the measure, it was Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver - who just happens to be a close and very loyal ally of the state's powerful teachers' unions - who refused to consider having the tuition tax deduction included in the final document that was approved last month.

So while Silver and his cohorts in the Assembly predictably denied the tax deduction, it does call for a look at what was done behind the scenes as budget negotiations heated up and it became perfectly clear to all who could see that a number of our state legislators continue to be beholden to special interest groups.

Enter an organization known as the New York State Catholic Conference, a group that moved swiftly into action by calling on the membership of the Catholic Advocacy Network, a statewide contingent that put together an action plan to send multiple messages to Spitzer and all state senators and Assembly members in an effort to try and convince them to include the tuition tax deduction in the 2007-08 spending plan.

Essentially, what you had transpire in the days leading up to the final vote on the budget, was a large group of people using the power of a single resource - the Internet - to pound home how they felt about the tuition tax deduction measure.

More than 30,000 e-mail messages were sent to Albany, with the general theme featuring the thought that the modest tax deduction for working families would be a matter of fairness when it comes to allowing all parents, regardless of their income, the basic opportunity to select which school their child will go to, including religious, independent and out-of-district public schools.

Locally, the legislator who was clocked in as being the top e-mail recipient was Sen. Mary Lou Rath. Legislative aides, public relations specialists, secretaries, office managers, interns and perhaps even members of the evening cleaning staff crew were all busy reading e-mail in Albany and in Rath's district office in Williamsville. The 531 e-mails that the Albany Times Union reported Rath received made it obvious the Diocese of Buffalo had several members tapping away at their keyboards and frantically clicking their mouses.

It appeared ultimately their messages were ignored by the leadership of the Assembly, something that didn't go over so well with Richard E. Barnes, executive director of the New York State Catholic Conference.

"This measure, a direct benefit to the hard-working families who seek a better future for their children, was turned back by Sheldon Silver and the state's teachers' unions, whose advocacy has resulted in per student spending that is ranked second among the 50 states and graduation rates that are a scandalous 48th," Barnes said in a terse statement that represented the New York State Bishops' stance on the matter. "The speaker could not see fit to give parents of children in independent and religious schools, who save the state $7.5 billion every single year, a deduction that amounts to about $68 per child."

So while their mass e-mail effort ultimately failed, the Catholic Conference was still proud of the fact that approximately 10,000 people responded to its call to fill up the inbox messages of their state legislators, with the 30,000 or so e-mails being sent in less than one week. The moral of the story? Great strides were made in an advocacy effort that gave the Catholic Church a stronger presence in the public policy process thanks to several folks who had a computer mouse in one hand and a Rosary in the other.

(Daniel Meyer is a columnist for the Weekly Independent Newspapers of Western New York. Opinions expressed here are those of the author.)