D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s decision to return the Fiscal Year 2025 Local Budget Act and Fiscal Year 2025 Local Budget Support Emergency Act unsigned, during the council’s summer recess, stemmed from, as she explained in a letter, a desire to avoid tax increases.
Such an explanation didn’t suffice for those who converged on the John A. Wilson Building in Northwest during the John Lewis Day of Action on July 17. As Bowser took to the podium in the lobby area, members of Fair Budget Coalition waved signs demanding that the mayor make “good trouble” with the interests of District residents in mind.
“Mayor Bowser is siding with the wealthiest people and she cut the budget that affects everyday people like myself,” said Angie Whitehurst, a lifelong D.C.resident and Fair Budget Coalition member who attempted to speak to Bowser during the John Lewis commemoration event.
Whitehurst, 71, expressed concerns about her ability, and that of other seniors, to live comfortably in the District. Bowser’s budget proposal, she said, didn’t protect the District’s most vulnerable residents. With Bowser’s latest move, Whitehurst told The Informer that she continues to question whether she cares about District residents.
“She should be like John Lewis since she talks about him so much,” Whitehurst said about Bowser. “Good trouble isn’t cutting D.C. childcare. It’s not signing with billionaires. It’s not eliminating emergency rental assistance. We really need to invest in the residents and people of the city. Her refusal to sign the budget is, without question, anti-Black, anti-poor and anti community.”
Mayor Bowser Puts Her Foot Down
In her July 16 letter, Bowser criticized the council’s addition of a property tax category for “high-value” homes, along with business and utility taxes. She also questioned whether budget cuts to D.C. Public Schools central office would keep students safe and improve the quality of instruction.
Toward the end of her correspondence, Bowser implored council members to act without the Tax Revision Commission in choosing areas of spending on which they can collaborate with her during the council recess. She then warned her legislative counterparts that, without revenue growth, the council cannot sustain programs that they allocated funding for in the Fiscal Year 2025 budget.
“[M]any of the programs the council is championing this year will be on the chopping block in a few short months,” Bowser’s letter said. “By working together on this important task, we can do the work needed before next year’s budget formulation.”
Per its website, the Tax Revision Commission is scheduled to finalize and present its recommendations and report to Bowser and the council in September.
The most recent version of recommendations compiled by the D.C. Tax Revision Commission, released in early July, includes an expansion of the child tax credit to all District children, a repeal of basic business license fees, an elimination of preferential tax rate for electric vehicles and high-mileage vehicles, and the elimination of quarterly sales tax minimum for street vendors.
As the commission’s discussion around the D.C. tax code nears the end, advocates continue to press for changes that shift more of the financial burden on the District’s wealthiest.
During the budget season, Just Recovery DC, a coalition composed of D.C. residents, grassroots organizers, tax policy experts, and organizers, released The People’s Tax Plan. The recommendations outlined in that document included tax increases on capital gains and high incomes, and restructuring of the Business Activity Tax.
For coalition members, Bowser and the council fell short in fully incorporating The People’s Tax Plan into the FY 2025 budget. After she sent the budget back to the council unsigned, they counted among those who questioned the mayor’s sincerity about helping D.C. residents.
“Contrary to what she said in her letter, Mayor Bowser raised taxes in ways that will hit hard at those struggling the most while pursuing spending cuts that demand the biggest sacrifices from D.C.’s lowest income residents,” coalition members said in their statement, “all while rejecting efforts to ask more of the wealthiest among us.”
The coalition issued a call to action.
“Together, we can fight for a tax system for justice so we can avoid harmful budget cuts, end poverty in the District, and build an inclusive economy rooted in community care.”
Concerns about More Republican Interference
In his criticism of the mayor, D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) pointed out some similarities in how she and the council approached the budget.
“She criticizes the council for raising taxes, but leaves out that she asked to raise taxes, too,” Mendelson said about Bowser. “She criticizes our four-year total of $530 million, but she sought a four-year total increase of $1.8 billion. She complains about the council increasing spending, but actually she submitted a [Fiscal Year 2025] budget more than $1 billion over the current year’s budget,” Mendelson continued.
“We added to it only slightly – about $40 million.”
For Mendelson, Bowser’s latest budget decision also calls into question whether she cares about protecting Home Rule. “The final budget has fostered very little criticism from the community at-large” Mendelson said. “Only the mayor seems to still be upset. By her critical letter, is the mayor asking, once again, that Congress take note and intervene in our local affairs?”
Ruqiyyah Anbar-Shaheen, director of early childhood at DC Action, expressed similar thoughts about Bowser’s refusal to sign the FY 2025 budget. She told The Informer that the mayor’s decision jeopardizes the work of the Under 3 DC Coalition and further encourages meddling by outside conservative forces.
“Under 3 DC and the D.C. Council worked hard to fill in the devastating child care funding gaps Mayor Bowser’s budget would have created, cuts that would have hurt working families and the economy,” Anbar-Shaheen said.
“With the Republican presidential nominee threatening to take over D.C. and some of his congressional supporters proposing legislation that strips us of our ability to govern early education and other critical issues, we need our leaders to take a stand for D.C. families. By not signing the budget, Mayor Bowser has done the opposite,” she added.
The Informer unsuccessfully attempted to gather comment from Bowser’s office about whether an unsigned budget places the District in a greater position for congressional interference.
A Proposal in the Works for a Permanent Commission
Bowser’s FY 2025 budget proposal, released during the earlier part of April, included an increase in the sales tax and cuts to expansion of the D.C. Earned Income Tax Credit. Within weeks, the D.C. Council approved changes that council members championed as more protective of the District’s marginalized populations.
Council members shaped this budget despite what D.C. Councilmember Brianne Nadeau (D-Ward 1) called the D.C. Tax Revision Commisssion’s sluggishness in releasing finalized recommendations that could guide the discussions. She and D.C. Councilmember Zachary Parker (D-Ward 5) would later introduce legislation to establish a permanent Tax & Revenue Commission.
“The idea is that having a standing commission with experts on finance could help us service a year-round think tank and analyze good policy,” Nadeau told The Informer in June as she discussed the difficulties of shaping the FY 2025 budget. “It was more challenging without a recommendation. The Tax Revision Commission dropped the ball.”
