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N EWS RELEASE
Date: January 20, 2000 NCSL Adopts Model Legislation WASHINGTON, DC - State legislatures have taken a significant step toward ensuring a fair and equitable solution to the e-commerce issue. The Executive Committee of the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) has unanimously endorsed model legislation as the first step in ensuring tax equity and fairness between "Main Street" businesses and remote sellers, including Internet retailers. The intent of the draft legislation is to allow states to participate in discussions with other states on developing a voluntary, streamlined, multi-state system for the collection and administration of existing sales and use taxes. The model legislation incorporates the Streamlined Sales Tax System for the 21st Century proposal that has been developed by NCSL and the National Governor's Association. NCSL's Executive Committee Task Force on State and Local Taxation of Telecommunications and Electronic Commerce has worked for the last year to address how states can modernize their state-local sales and use tax systems to accommodate the rapid changes in technology and the explosion of Internet commerce. The sales and use tax currently generates over $150 billion for states, almost one-third of state budgets, with much of the revenue used to fund K-12 education and public safety. "NCSL's model legislation is a bold step in preserving the vital services that state governments have a moral responsibility to provide such as education and crime prevention," stated Tennessee Representative Matthew Kisber, co-chairman of the Task Force. "This proposal has nothing to do with creating new taxes. It merely provides states with the opportunity to develop a more simple, uniform and fair system of state sales and use taxation without mandates or interference from the federal government," declared Task Force co-chairman Illinois Senator Steven Rauschenberger. The NCSL Executive Committee will submit the model legislation to each of the state legislature's legislative leaders. It is expected that several states will enact the legislation this year. It is NCSL's hope that this first group of states will lay the groundwork for the Streamlined Sales Tax System for the 21st Century and for the other states to follow over the next two to five years. NCSL is a bipartisan organization that serves the legislators and staffs of the nation's 50 states, its commonwealths and territories and the District of Columbia. NCSL provides research, technical assistance and the opportunity for policymakers to exchange ideas on the most pressing state issues. NCSL also is an effective and respected representative for the interests of state governments before Congress and federal agencies.
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