Archbishop attacks effort to reinstate food tax
SANTA FE, N.M. Archbishop of Santa Fe John C. Wester on Tuesday was joined by a number of advocates for children and families to denounce attempts by some state legislators to reinstate the food tax.
Our neighbors are hungry, he told a group at the Catholic Center in Albuquerque. At this time as we prepare for Christmas, countless nonprofits and civic organizations work to fill food baskets, but some legislators want to take food out of another basket, the grocery basket, with their proposed food tax.
Wester pointed to recent discussions in legislative interim hearings in which the reinstatement of the food tax has been suggested as a way to raise revenue for the state, which is experiencing a deficit because gas and oil revenues have plummeted.
This tortilla tax, as many have labeled it, only shifts the burden onto the poor and working families, Wester said. What makes this idea even more obscene is that New Mexico ranks second-highest in the nation for children living in hunger and
highest for children living in poverty.
Read more: https://www.abqjournal.com/912972/archbishop-adds-voice-to-chorus-of-those-opposed-to-food-tax.html