State Senator Ralph Okerlund has weighed in sharing his opinion and some details about the proposed state tax reform package.

He shared that the task force has voted to move forward with the recommendation to the legislature and that it looks like a special session will be called for on Thursday Dec. 12.

Okerlund stated that “until we get that out of the way everything else has taken a back seat and that’s one of the reasons for moving forward with it in a special session instead of a regular session.”

He also went on to talk about how it won’t make all the legislators happy and that even he doesn’t like parts of it, but that he feels it will get better over time with many amendments expected in the next couple of years.

He stated “when you do tax reform it takes a few years to nip at everything and make sure everything is right and get everything the way the legislature wants it, it’s not an easy process.”

Okerlund wanted to make sure people knew that this is a tremendous tax cut of nearly $160 million with low and middle income families seeing most of the benefits.

The tax cuts will come from decreasing the corporate franchise income tax and the personal income tax rate from 4.95% to 4.66%.

There will be some increases in other taxes like fuel taxes and some services, but Okerlund shared that there are very few services compared to the original bill that was put forward last year.

There will be an increase on sales tax on unprepared food (groceries) from 1.75% to 4.85%, back to where it was before it was lowered almost ten years ago. Although low income families will get money back on purchases they make at the stores, getting $50 back per person at the end of the year as a tax credit.

You can currently read the bill on the legislative website and there is also a good synopsis on the Salt Lake City Chamber of Commerce website if you would like to know more details on the bill.