Repeal Tax on
Vending Machines
California voters repealed taxes on “snack foods” sold in grocery stores, catering trucks and convenience stores in 1992. However, we forgot to eliminate the tax applied to the same snack food sold in vending machines.
As the governor and our legislators consider crafting a tax relief package as part of their plan to wisely spend our $12 billion surplus, they have an opportunity to correct this oversight and eliminate all taxes on water and snack food. There is no reason to penalize the people who want, or rely on vending machines for, these products.
Wayne Hood
President
Hood Services Inc.
Bellflower
Hundreds of thousands of Californians rely on vending machine products every day. From military bases and hospitals to dorm rooms, vending machines offer workers and students convenient access to affordable beverage and snack-food items.
The current tax on snacks from vending machines is not in keeping with the will of California voters who eliminated the tax for the same items sold in grocery and convenience stores back in 1992.
It’s only fair that repealing this tax is part of the tax relief package currently being developed by lawmakers.
Richard Atnip
Atnip Co.
Fullerton
Buchanan and Reform
I’ve been reading of various people in the California Reform Party saying that they want to split off from the national party because of Pat Buchanan.
I understand the arguments of those who want to split off, but I think their fear of Buchanan is misplaced. As one who lived in the Haight-Ashbury, near Harvard Square, near Georgetown and near Greenwich Village and who has been involved in various counter-culture lifestyles, I have no fear that Buchanan wants to impinge on my lifestyle.
Buchanan is bringing in to the party what, for lack of a better term, might be called the Bohemian right/left, along with the little people who realize that the big-bucks elites are simply passing political power back and forth among their fraternity brothers.
Buchanan and the Reform Party, if they understand the long view of history and engage in some real party building, have a chance to bring power back to the people.
H. Millard
Costa Mesa
Bravo, Rick
What a wonderful May 22 Notebook by Rick Reiff on his ascension to the executive editorship! As a fellow Chicago Italo-American, I am proud of him. Thank heavens he’ll still be writing the OC Insider, a column that has become a veritable institution in Orange County. I am particularly happy that one of his “value-added” pursuits will be teaching at Chapman.
I have been president at Chapman for about as long as Rick has served as editor of the OCBJ. It has been fun struggling through our county’s recession to the dynamic growth we are experiencing today. I know I speak for many fellow OCBJ readers when I say Rick’s intimate, cogent and perceptive analyses of the local economy and business scene make it seem like we all have been through it together as partners.
Orange County is truly fortunate to have such a gifted journalist in its midst. And I am pleased he is staying in our midst.
My goodness, what would the CHOC Follies do without Rick?
James L. Doti
President and Donald Bren Professor
Chapman University
Orange
I wanted to congratulate Rick Reiff upon his successful completion of his term as editor of the Orange County Business Journal, as well as my regret that he has left the position. He did an extraordinary job in developing the Business Journal into a first-class piece of journalism.
I also appreciated his kindred spirit in political incorrectness.
James J. McDonald Jr.
Fisher & Phillips LLP
Newport Beach
