HJTA Files Class Action Lawsuit Against Fire Tax and Guess Who Wants to Raise Your Taxes? – By Jon Coupal

Sacramento – Recently, the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association filed a class action lawsuit to provide relief to nearly one million California property owners who received bills from the State for a new “fire prevention fee” which the lawsuit claims is illegal.

The class action complaint, filed today in Superior Court in Sacramento, seeks to overturn the fire fee, which costs property owners an additional $150 per year for each habitable structure on their property. The class action names plaintiffs from Kern County, Mendocino County, Calaveras County, Butte County, San Bernardino County, Solano County, San Luis Obispo County, El Dorado County, and Lassen County, who together represent a cross-section of the roughly 825,000 property owners subject to the new fee. As the state’s largest taxpayers’ association, HJTA is challenging the constitutionality of the fee on the grounds it is really a tax that needed a two-thirds vote in the Legislature to pass, but garnered only a bare majority and therefore never became law.

The complaint was filed against the California Department of Forestry and the Board of Equalization, as the two agencies responsible for identifying owners of the parcels subject to the new tax and collecting the tax, respectively. If the class action suit is successful, approximately 825,000 homeowners could be eligible for refunds.
“This tax was dreamed up by politicians in Sacramento who are so desperate for revenue that they were willing to ram this through the Legislature without the proper two-thirds vote,” said Jon Coupal, President of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. “The fire tax is a direct violation of Prop. 13. It is our goal to overturn this tax, prevent the politicians from taking more money from hardworking people for a program they were already paying for, and help taxpayers to get a refund from the government.”
To be eligible for a refund, property owners must first pay their bill, then file a protest with the State. HJTA has established a website that shows how to protest the fee and provides the necessary forms. Property owners can also sign up for free e-mail bulletins that will keep them informed of the progress of the class action suit.
For more information, visit www.HJTA.org and click on the “Fire Tax Protest” banner.

Guess Who Wants to Raise Your Taxes
This is something concerned taxpayers and citizens need to know! Listed below are the top 11 contributors that want to raise your taxes.
But wait! That’s not the whole story. Just to whet your appetite, how about companies who have donated $100,000 plus to raise your taxes? Industries such as Health Care, tobacco, pharmaceuticals, CA hospitals, insurance, nurses, entertainment companies, telecommunications, financial services, beverage manufacturers and distributors and Indian tribes to name a few.
The $100,000 club includes companies like: Blue Shield, AERA Energy, Occidental Petroleum, America Beverage Corp., Disney, Warner Bros., Viacom, CBS, NBC, Sony, Dignity Health, Anthem Blue Cross, State Farm, California Cable & Telecommunications Assn., Pepsi Cola and Coca Cola and many, many more.

The Top 11 Contributors Are:

Everyone needs to know who thinks you are not paying enough taxes. Please pass this along to friends and associates.

Jon Coupal is President of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association – California’s largest grass-roots taxpayer organization dedicated to the protection of Proposition 13 and the advancement of taxpayers’ rights.