Sen. Nelson Speaks About Legislation to Provide Tax Relief For Disaster Areas
Mr. President, I am the Senator from
By the way, speaking of bipartisanship, there is a good example.
When it comes to looking at what is happening in
Finally, Wednesday night of last week, they sent me a three-star general who started to get it organized. Now we are seeing it distributed out, but it is going to take more because it is an island that is just absolutely devastated. It is going to take a long time to recover, and it is going to take a lot more money.
Remember, these are our fellow American citizens. We saw the devastation in
Whereas, in
We are working on a supplemental funding bill. Remember that right after the first storm in
As you can imagine, now it is not just
Today I am going to introduce a piece of legislation. I call it the National Disaster Tax Relief Act, which would give people affected by these storms some much needed tax relief. This is in the shadow of the conversations taking place, as we speak, in a hearing--which I have just come from--in the
The bill I am introducing today would do four things: One, it would let businesses and farmers immediately write off their cleanup costs, not just their replacement costs.
For example, the
Go further south into
Therefore, there are a number of these groves that have been abandoned, but it is valuable land. We need to give an incentive to the citrus grower to be able to go in and plow under that citrus growth and replant--the immediate expensing of that plowing under, plus the replanting of what we think are hardier varieties of citrus that are more resistant to this disease, this bacteria called greening. We think that would be a huge incentive to try to save the citrus industry not only in my State but in
The second thing the bill does is it gives taxpayers the ability to exempt State and local disaster mitigation payments from Federal taxes, and it lets them save for the next big storm tax-free. That would be in a catastrophe savings account.
It would allow people to save tax-free
The bill also includes extra infrastructure financing for areas damaged by the storms; for example, help for low-income housing needs and other infrastructure needs that are so important to economic recovery.
The fourth thing the bill does is it includes tax incentives for
Why should we treat our American citizens in a territory any differently taxwise on a child tax credit than we treat our citizens on the mainland, the main 50 States? It shouldn't be. It doesn't make sense.
What is happening in
The
As we are going into a supplemental package for all of these storm- affected areas, and since the utilities in
We are working on this supplemental package to get additional aid to those suffering, and I am hopeful that what I have suggested here as a tax incentive will be a part of that conversation. Our country is hurting. We should be doing everything we can to help it heal.
Now, not only are we healing from coming out of some ferocious storms, but now we have another grim reminder that, in America, we are not treating each other as we would want to be treated. Something is wrong in the psyche of some, so that whatever the motivation is, there would be mass execution. I hope we will soon have a very serious conversation about the direction of this country.
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