Money Starts to Flow for 2010 Tax Battle

You can bet that the looming ballot battle next January over increased personal income taxes on wealthier Oregonians — as well as higher corporate income taxes— will feature riotous rhetoric, cataclysmic claims and above all, carloads of cash.

Yesterday, in a filing with the Oregon Secretary of State, the Oregon Restaurant Association disclosed a $25,000 gift to the evocatively named "Oregonians Against Job Killing Taxes" (OAJKT). And today the Oregon Local Grocery Committee gave the same amount.

OAJKT is so new that it does not yet appear to have made a committee filing with the Secretary of State. But its address is 867 Liberty Street NE, Salem, which is the address of Public Affairs Counsel, the lobbying and strategy firm run by Mark Nelson, who organized the defeat of a tobacco tax in 2008.

Nelson will probably face off against the union-backed advocacy group Our Oregon to determine whether the new taxes stick. Today, Defend Oregon, an umbrella group organized to battle conservative ballot measures in 2008 transferred $50,000 to Our Oregon.