Tax Day Vote - April 2001 How would you like to vote on where your tax money is spent? That opportunity was offered on "Tax Day," Monday, April 16. The Traverse Bay Watershed and Betsie Watershed Green Parties conducted a Ten Penny Voters' Tax Day Poll in front of five area post offices on the April 16th, 2001. Voters were given ten pennies to distribute as they wish into any of the five "Ballet Bottles." Candidates for voters' ten pennies are: Military, Health & Education, Environment and Natural Resources, International Affairs, and General Government. Actually, the federal budget is broken into thirteen categories which will be included in the five major ballot bottles by the Greens. Voting took place at the Traverse City, Frankfort, Beulah, Benzonia, and Honor post offices. The following, together with the statistical breakout of the Tax Day Poll results, was sent to our Federal and State Representatives, Senators, and Executives (Bush & Engler). You can download a graph of the statistical breakout results as a .pdf file: taxgraph.pdf "Please review the enclosed documents on our Tax Day Poll by your constituents. 862 people voted where they would like their tax dollars to be spent. April 16, 2001, was a bitter cold rain and blowing snow day here in Northern, Michigan. People were rushing on their way to or from work, getting their tax forms into the mail. Yet they stopped. They voted. Some talked. You can see the results on the enclosed documents. T.V. Channels 7 & 4, did an in depth coverage of one of the five polling sites in Benzie County posting results on their 11:00 news. T.V. 9 & 10 made three stops for live coverage at downtown Traverse City poll. It was broadcast throughout the day concluding with two in depth presentations at six and eleven, again with the results. Interlochen Public Radio did interviews on site and also broadcast the results. Enclosed is the Record Eagle article with a color picture on the front page, Tuesday April 17 edition. All of this is to let you know that our goal of educating the public to its own priorities for the use of tax dollars happened. It was broadcast all over of northwest lower Michigan. Many people thanked us for conducting the poll. Some expressed their hopelessness for ever getting these issues heard by their representatives. We said we would send the results to the media and to our elected representatives. This same letter is being sent to all our federal and state representatives from northern Michigan. We ask you to respond to what 862 of your constituents expressed as their priorities for their tax dollars. We will make your response known on Mothers' Day weekend, Saturday and Sunday May 12th and 13th. Thank you for attending to this request on behalf of our Ten Penny Poll participants and the public at large." Tom Shea 529 West 9th Street, Traverse City, MI 49684 (231) -946-3693 <shea@traverse.com> More information on the web here: Green Party USA http://www.greenparty.org Center for Defense Information http://www.cdi.org/issues/usmi/fy01/Discre.html Office of Management and Budget. http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/

CENTER HOME