Who should receive tax relief?

No matter how one felt about Donald Trump’s promise not to tax tips, Kamala Harris made it a non-issue by adopting it. It is doubtful that Congress would pass such a benefit.

It never made sense to not tax tips. Those who earn a small amount of tips can claim the standard deduction like everyone else. Some workers – head waiters, concierges, wine waiters, doormen in fancy hotels, etc. – can earn six figures. Why shouldn’t they pay taxes?

A better idea would be to abolish income taxes for those who risk their lives for the rest of us.

Military personnel who are in potential danger – not desk jockeys, “planners,” the big shots – should get that income tax-free. Firefighters should also get that tax break when they’re on the road – not when they’re making chili or polishing engines. Cops who execute warrants on the street and arrest potentially dangerous people – not the ones they dispatch from their desks – should get hazard pay starting April 15.

This could be a more popular promise that does not separate people based on their pay, but serves as a financial thank you to those who do what most cannot or will not.

Carman Comfort

Chesterfield Twp.

Kroger problem resurfaces at SCS

In St. Clair Shores, the issue is the approval of a zoning plan for a Kroger gas station at the corner of Nine Mile Road and Harper, which the City Council postponed until September 3rd for a traffic study. I want to tell you what happened 14 years ago.

In the summer of 2009, I gave a speech to the City Council expressing my support for the Kroger gas station at the corner of 13 Mile Road and Harper. Kroger had a store there. Good business. Good investment in the city.

In the fall of 2010, I spoke out against a proposed Kroger gas station near the Nine Mile/Greater Mack corridor on several occasions. During public participation, I shared my arguments with the 2010 SCS City Council. For example, Nine Mile Road from Jefferson to two miles west already had more gas stations than any other mile of the SCS. Additionally, the Nine Mile area was experiencing population decline.

Even the construction of this gas station directly opposite the St. Mary’s nursing and rehabilitation center would have had negative effects at that time.

Citizen Chuck Hall and even myself spoke up and stated that Kroger could use the Nine Mile/Jefferson site, where a closed Shell gas station was located, for its own purposes.

I remember at the SCS council meeting where the council was to make its final decision, the owner of the Shell station on Great Mack, about a half mile from Nine Mile Road, told me he had spent $40,000 at Kroger so his customers could redeem their Kroger points at his Shell station.

Councilman Peter Rubino told me he had changed his mind and would vote against the Kroger plan. The SCS council rejected Kroger’s request. Kroger eventually built its gas station at Nine Mile Road and Jefferson. That station is
perfect and halfway between the two Krogers for many years. And this has not increased the existing number of gas stations along the Nine Mile Road corridor. Good business.

What does Kroger do as time goes on? They packed up and left the 13 Mile Road and Harper location. Bad business. That’s the thanks SCS got.

Now, 14 years later, Kroger is moving from Nine Mile/Greater Mack to Nine Mile and Harper and plans to build nine gas stations there, at the intersection of which there is already a Shell station. Nothing has changed in 14 years. The arguments I made to the City Council in 2010 still hold in 2024. There are still many more gas stations along Nine Mile Road than are probably needed, and no population boom.

I urge the SCS City Council, and especially the members who were there 14 years ago, to remember the past and what Kroger has done to SCS over the last 14 years.

If Kroger was truly interested in SCS and was going to invest in SCS, then Kroger would have to come up with a site plan to reopen at 13 Mile/Harper. That would be good business. That would show a commitment to our city now and in the future. And it’s not just about making money or taking business away from the existing Nine Mile gas stations that have been there for decades.

Joseph Backus

St. Clair Shores

Originally published: August 18, 2024 at 11:26 am