Students seeking relief from the spiraling cost of textbooks might soon enjoy a solution to the problem.
Northwestern’s Associated Student Government has joined a coalition of other Illinois universities to lobby the state legislature for tax-free textbooks. After working with student representatives from the University of Illinois, who are spearheading the effort, Republican Rep. Richard Winkel sponsored a bill to eliminate the state’s portion of the tax.
Instead of being charged an 8.5 percent tax on textbooks, students at any university in Illinois would only have to pay a rate of 1.25 percent. But the bill, which would cost the state between $15 to $20 million, is stuck in the House Appropriations Committee and cannot be passed before November.
ASG President Adam Humann, who came up with the idea of lobbying for tax-free textbooks while running two years ago for student services vice president, said the project is one of the long-term goals in which ASG should invest time.
“The key to a project like this is unity among all the colleges in the state,” said Humann, a Weinberg senior. “I’m glad other schools have seen the merit of this issue and want to work on it. But it has to be a unilateral effort.”
But Stephanie Halvorson, who has been lobbying the legislature as University of Illinois’ student government affairs committee chairwoman, said the bill is stuck in the appropriations committee because of the state’s budget deficit.
After working alongside 81 institutions of higher education in Illinois, Halvorson said she was disappointed to learn the state is in debt by $491 million for next year’s fiscal budget and the textbook issue was too costly.
“Springfield has widely supported the bill, so the only thing stopping us is the money issue,” she said. “The bill has already passed the rules committee, but it won’t get out of the appropriations committee this session.”
Halvorson, who estimates she has spent more than 200 hours pushing for the project and regularly lobbies for the bill in Springfield, said she will continue to contact legislators throughout the summer.
“Our goal is to get this passed as soon as possible, and our next chance is during the veto session in November,” she said. “With the budgetary hole, its hard to convince legislators the importance of saving students $50 on textbooks. But with all of the universities working together, we have strength in numbers.”
Jeremy Boni, textbook manager for Norris Center Bookstore, said taxing students at the proposed rate of 1.25 percent would lead to big savings.
“I’m all for the change since it will save students money,” Boni said. “We cannot control the price publishers set for books, and new editions are costing even more. We try to help out students as much as we can with prices, and the tax cut would also do that.”
Boni also said some students are turning to online sites as cheaper ways of buying textbooks, and he hopes the proposed tax cut would encourage more students to look to the official college bookstore first.
Weinberg junior Pamela Shelinsky, who recently bought a textbook online for her advertising class, said she would rather buy books from a bookstore, especially if taxes are lower.
“It’s more convenient to go to the store and have the book in your hands,” Shelinsky said. “For cost reasons, I’m sure people would prefer to buy in a bookstore if textbooks had no tax.”
