America’s Cities to Congress: NO to Eliminating Key Deductions that Support Cities and Families

WASHINGTON — September 27, 2017 — Today, the “Big 6” coalition released a tax plan that broadly outlined goals for tax reform. The plan suggests that most itemized deductions would be eliminated to offset lower tax rates, which will likely include the state and local tax (SALT) deduction. In response to today’s announcement, National League of Cities (NLC) President Matt Zone, councilmember, Cleveland, released the following statement:

“America’s cities agree that our tax code is overly-complicated and in need of reform. We are glad to see Congress and the administration willing to streamline the tax system and lower tax rates, but this reform effort cannot eliminate the critical tools that enable cities to strengthen communities, make infrastructure investments and keep residents safe.

“We will strongly oppose and work to defeat any effort to eliminate the state and local tax deduction or the tax exemption on municipal bonds. This is not a red versus blue issue, and this is not a coastal-cities versus the heartland-cities issue. Eliminating these deductions would be an ill-advised attempt to change the basic intergovernmental relationship that has existed and served American cities and families well since the first tax code was introduced in 1913.”

NLC is a founding member of the Americans Against Double Taxation coalition of state and local government organizations, service providers and other stakeholders dedicated to protecting the state and local tax deduction (SALT). Learn more about NLC’s tax policy at www.nlc.org/SALT.