[By the way, the name "Burnin' Vernon" is an idea I received from James King -- an ol' Phoenix New times journalist.  I would have enjoyed the Burnin' Vernon series from him had he stayed in Phoenix area (but he left Arizona and now he works in New York.]

Vernon Parker, a Republican candidate for Congressional District 9, seem to support the fire service fee [a/k/a tax], which the current Mayor and Town Council of Paradise Valley are attempting to force on their residents.  Parker, who is a member of the Paradise Valley Town Council despite his candidacy for congress, was one of six votes supporting the fee. The worst part is the fact that Paradise Valley had a balanced budget and millions in reserves — yet is proposing this fee.

According to some of those Tea Party hypocritical Republicans…Washington is already full of unaccountable politicians who do nothing but tax-and-spend, yet we see before our very eyes Arizona Republicans doing the same thing.

I need to verify the information within H.B. 2060 but from my read of the bill it appears that Catholics are subject to tax.  A phone call to Kevin McCarthy is in order because the bill has to do with a municipality of less than twenty thousand persons (a/k/a Paradise Valley), and certain entities are exempt.  It doesn’t appear that the Catholics are exempt and this needs to be clarified.  Why aren’t Catholics schools exempt?

Why is Chuck Coughlin (hired gun) seemingly trying to pass special legislation to circumvent the public hearing process?  Is this a way for the city council to circumvent the public so that the county assessor collects the fee [tax]?

If a person (like Burnin’ Vernon)  is elected to public office, then politicians should PUBLICLY state their policy direction. In other words…don’t be a public servant and run for political office if one doesn’t expect to be transparent, right?

Now let’s talk about these so-called fees, shall we?

A fee (for instance) is something that you would pay if you want to take a toll road or a light rail.  If people don’t want to voluntarily pay a fee — then they can either take a different road or drive their own cars or bikes to avoid paying these special fees.  However, if you take a look at this HB 2060 bill — you will find that these fees  are “involuntary” — in other words it has to be paid and the county collector expects to collect it.

There ya have it, folks.  It looks like Burnin’ Vernon is supporting new taxes in Paradise Valley. So much for less taxes and smaller government.