Governor Ricketts and some lawmakers clash over proposed grocery tax bill

With lowering property tax being the main issue facing this legislative session, some senators have proposed the idea of solving the solution by taxing some junk food and bottles of water.

“Taxing working Nebraskans and making their grocery bills more expensive by taxing food, pop, candy, bottled water, is not the answer that is reverse Robin Hood,” Gov. Pete Ricketts said.

Currently, the state of Nebraska is one of 32 other states that do not tax food.

Opponents believe this will hurt low–income families throughout Nebraska, but according to Sen. Tom Briese who introduced the bill, he says there is no intention of hurting any Nebraskans.

“Well we’re not talking about groceries here, we are talking about candy, talking about pop, talking about bottled water. We’re not talking about groceries, this does not have an adverse negative effect on low-income Nebraskans,” Sen. Tom Briese of Albion said.

The details inside this bill of what groceries are and are not taxed according to grocers are very complicated. Which has worried some grocers throughout the state on making a mistake taxing the wrong items.

“We in grocery stores have between 40,000 and 50,000 items in a typical grocery store, we believe we would have to read approximately 30,000 labels to determine what is and what is not taxable,” Kathy Siefken the NGIA Executive Director said.

According to the revenue committee, it could be just one part of a package of bills that would provide $570 million worth of property tax relief.

While Governor Ricketts wants to make major cuts to the state’s budget to offset the Nebraska property tax problem.

Some state senators don’t believe it’s the right way to solve the tax issue.

“The only responsible way delivering meaningful and substantial property tax relief is to access other revenue sources. It’s irresponsible to suggest that we can slash and burn our way to the property tax relief Nebraska deserve,” Sen. Tom Briese added.

The Nebraska legislature’s revenue committee is planning on meeting later this month to debate how they will solve the problem of property tax relief.