Sens. Green, Stevens hand another victory to special interests

May 21, 2006

VALLEY VOICES/Myrl Thompson

The 13th century philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas coined the phrase &#8220corruptio optimi pessima.” Translated from his Latin, it means &#8220corruption of the best is worst of all.” This quote may have been born of hindsight, but its sentiment is certainly alive and well in Alaska politics today.

The separation of church and state did not occur until many centuries after Aquinas, with the inception of our own country. The founding fathers had had their fill of state-sponsored religion with the Church of England. In colonial America, the dissenting religious sects or any church other than the &#8220official” one had to pay a tax to the state.

This practice may have been on the minds of the framers of our Constitution, since the Baptists, Shakers, Quakers and the rest were no longer discriminated against through law or tax after independence. Written into the Constitution was an edict against state-sponsored religious institution. Freedom to practice any religious belief, or nonbelief, became the law of the land. That is, provided the practice didn't violate other civil laws or constitutional rights.

Throughout history, the blending of church and state has been responsible for a multitude of sins in the name of God. Jesus may have been doomed by the mix of the Sanhedrin and the Roman state.

The Spanish Inquisition, which tortured and murdered countless victims, was also the result of the intertwining of politics and religion. The Salem witch trials were another example of such a mix. And war after bloody war was caused and accelerated by this often deadly mix of man's political and religious shortsightedness working hand in hand.

The present-day blurring of the lines between politics and religion may very well lead to trouble for us down the line. We are straying away from the sound principles of our founding fathers, little by little. Each wayward step is justified by one special interest or another that inevitably has the ear or vote of someone in power.

A perfect closer-to-home example of this unsavory mixing was the tax exemption recently delivered to Jerry Prevo's Anchorage Baptist Temple. The exemption was hand-carried around sound public process for the benefit of a special interest group.

The first attempt to do so was made back in March, when Sen. Ben Stevens tried to hijack an otherwise worthy and unrelated bill by fellow Anchorage senator Con Bunde, by attaching the Baptist Temple tax exemption to it. Everyone who testified about the changed bill, including me, was appalled by the audacity of Stevens and ABT lobbyist Glenn Clary in the commandeering of Bunde's legislation.

The tax exemption will allow the wealthy Anchorage church to save tens of thousands of dollars yearly on its many additional properties, with no end in sight. If the church is rich enough to buy hundreds of houses, it could legally not have to pay tax on any of them. One testifier called the newly changed bill, &#8220black-collar crime.”

With Bunde's disapproval and overwhelming opposition, one would have thought the idea would have died an easy death. This obviously was not to be the case.

Just like a parasite that falls off one host but lands on another, the freeloader exemption did manage to survive. Sen. Lyda Green, a recent illegal contributor to a Glenn Clary-chaired special interest group, did her friend a special favor and attached the Stevens tax exemption to another bill in her committee during the final few days of the legislative session earlier this month.

Sen. Green used her trademark special tactic of making bad additions to otherwise decent legislation with skill and abandon. The longtime Mat-Su senator has shown no shame about subverting public process if it benefits one of her own. In addition to being a Baptist Temple administrator and hard-nosed unregistered lobbyist for the church, Glenn Clary is the treasurer of the Alaska Republican Party.

The new special-interest legislation passed the Republican-controlled Legislature without a soul testifying in support of it. The wide condemnation of the Stevens attempt to pass the exemption was successfully subverted by Green and her Finance Committee. And a special interest once again trumped fairness and the will of the people.

The winners were the Anchorage Baptist Temple, the Republican Party agenda and the mixing of church and state. The losers were the rest of us, especially property-tax payers.

The $25,000 that the ABT will save yearly on its ancillary housing will be passed on to other Anchorage taxpayers. It is just as if Jerry Prevo were passing around an offering plate to the citizens of Anchorage, but this plate demands a mandatory offering.

Regardless of their religious beliefs or nonbeliefs, citizens will now effectively be subsidizing the Anchorage Baptist Temple. It's a robbing of Peter Public to pay Paul Baptist — and another blurring of the lines between church and state.

Valley resident Myrl Thompson is a citizen lobbyist, free-lance political columnist and former independent candidate for the District 15 state House seat. His Valley Voices guest opinion column appears here every four weeks.