Wheel Tax and Corruption

​Friends and Constituents,

I hope you’re all well. It has been a ridiculously busy week for me. Here’s a partial list of what I’ve been up to:-Monday: Presented a resolution about abolishing parking minimums and fought for a data center moratorium and ban at the Council committee meeting.

-Tuesday: Recorded a fantastic podcast about democratic socialism, met with two constituents, and walked the Teamsters 135 picket line at Vestis for an hour.

-Wednesday: Participated in a UAW action in Plainfield at 5:30 am, fought at the MDC hearing against data centers and called for the Council to remove the Commissioners who have refused our call for a moratorium.

-Thursday: Met a new Masarachia Scholar to set up an internship which will focus on bringing more youth and Spanish speakers into contact with Council work; joined the NESCO land use committee to brainstorm ways to effectively fight a new gas station at 16th and Emerson.

-Friday: Pushed my fellow Councilors to consider ways to mitigate the regressive aspects of Proposal 192 by supporting programs to help the working poor. Walked the track at the Frederick Douglass Park Family Center gym with some friends and got dinner afterwards.

​-Saturday: Attended the MACANA meeting to talk about data centers and hear from IMPD Chief Tanya Terry. Visited the Kennedy-King Park Pool for a dip (since Brookside Park Pool was closed all week for maintenance!). Met with my Deputy Councilor of Urbanist Affairs, Will Hazen, to discuss a long list of improvements needed in the district and celebrate some recent wins. Chatted with a group of socialists from across the country.

-Today: Presenting the final session of a seven-week candidate training series I hosted for my friend Ben Davis and his team.

But the work never stops, and so the weekly newsletters must flow.

Today I wanted to focus once again on Indianapolis’s proposed Wheel Tax (Proposal 192). Watch the video below and then keep reading!

My stance on this issue, based on constituent feedback, has been: 

-The Statehouse is robbing Marion County openly, and forcing us to jump through arbitrary hoops in order to have a chance at getting some of our own money back.

-The most important thing we can do is resist the Republican legislature and overthrow them politically as soon as possible.

-Within the spectrum of maneuvers that are legally available to the Council, I reluctantly support Proposal 192.

But in the last week, a few things have changed. 

First, corrupt and scandal-plagued Mayor Joe Hogsett vetoed the Council proposal. We can override his veto, but need 17 “yes” votes on August 10th in order to get there.

Second, corrupt Councilor and candidate for Mayor Vop Osili proposed a new plan for using wheel tax funds, in response to Hogsett’s veto.

The majority of my constituents and supporters have continued to support the wheel tax. But a growing minority of voices has been asking me to reconsider my position on the topic. 

The two biggest reasons I’m being asked to vote “no” are extremely reasonable:1. The wheel tax would cause a substantial burden to low-income drivers in the district. 

Drivers of the oldest and least valuable vehicles would see the steepest increase in their bills, some of them up to $92 a year. I will credit Mayor Hogsett for a grain of truth in his misleading statement: “Families across our city are making difficult financial choices every day.”2. The people administering the City budget are corrupt and cannot be trusted. 

Some people misunderstand the facts on the ground, and worry that the funds from the wheel tax or the Statehouse match will be spent on items other than road funding. This specific fear is baseless; there are plenty of controls to prevent funds from being drastically misspent and misappropriated. However, it’s absolutely true that Hogsett’s administration has been misspending money and giving contracts, land, and board appointments to his donors and loyalists. Some of the biggest firms implicated in the corruption are the firms that get big contracts with the City to do Public Works projects like roads. 

I’m sad to report that when I reached out to all of my fellow co-sponsors on Proposal 192 in order to find a way to prevent the working poor from being so negatively impacted, none of them so much as acknowledged receipt of my message.​

Based on the release of Councilor Osili’s plan on Friday, I am concerned that my colleagues may believe that this short-sighted plan improves Proposal 192. I deeply disagree.

Councilor Osili’s plan would not solve either of the two major constituent concerns I outlined. It ignores the working class, and it deepens the city’s corruption.

In short, his plan would take out a large loan for the city in order to spend future revenue today, accelerating the badly-needed road reconstruction. At a surface level, this isn’t such a bad plan. The interest we would pay on the loans might well be less expensive than the cost of deferred maintenance and deterioration of our streets from a slower plan.

But this plan does nothing to help the poor and working class of our city. The plan refers to “equity” in terms of where in the City money is spent on roads, but not equity in terms of how the financial impact lands on constituents. Residents struggling to pay our bills would see no relief in Osili’s plan.

But who would benefit from this plan? 

The same donors and loyalists that Hogsett is enriching today.

The City of Indianapolis already spends nearly 90 million dollars annually on contractors and “services” provided by private businesses. That’s over a third of the total DPW budget! Accelerating the construction schedule would mean spending a massive amount of money on hiring even more contractors to complete the work. 

Contractors are already causing massive problems by mismanaging projects and not being held accountable across the city. (Case in point: the Brookside Park playgrounds were contracted to be installed and ready for use by May 31, 2024. Instead, they were unusable until July 2026 thanks to the contractor failing eight times to secure proper permits.) The City does not have sufficient staff to properly manage and supervise contractors on this many projects, and I have serious concerns about the quality of work we’d be able to expect under Osili’s plan.

But at least the big donors would make massive profits - and would almost certainly kick back some of those profits to Osili.

Frankly, Osili’s plan on how to use the wheel tax revenue makes me rethink my stance on the issue.

I’ve let my colleagues know that I’m wavering in my support for this proposal, and need to see more energy and focus on helping the working class. 

As always, though, I don’t vote based on my own whims. I vote the way my bosses ask me to.

​What do you think?

​Are our roads and alleys in such bad shape that I should support this deeply flawed proposal anyway?

Should I insist on more money being spent to help the poor and working class?

Should I demand more funds for alleys, the number one complaint I receive in the district?

​Or should I simply vote no?

I hope to hear from as many people as possible so as to help inform my vote on August 10th!

​But one thing remains clear: the political establishment of both parties is bleeding this city and state dry to enrich their donors. We need a new Mayor, a new Legislature, and a new Governor; we can only get that when we keep organizing and keep fighting. 

Since I haven't asked for donations in a while, I'll do so now. Help me keep organizing and keep fighting. Chip in what you can​.

Thank you all!
In love and solidarity,Jesse