In the Auburn Reporter, Don Brunell wrote a piece, “Carbon fee hurts business and families,” (Oct. 12), where he argues that cutting carbon emissions is a laudable goal, but that this particular carbon tax is too harmful to soccer moms, small produce companies and local supermarkets.

After surveying a series of inflated costs, Brunell concludes with the wish that backers of I-1631 consider revenue neutral proposals like I-732, the revenue-neutral carbon tax that failed in 2016. Yet the very organization that Brunell used to lead, the Association of Washington Business (AWB), ran a series of ads against I-732 that recapitulates – almost point for point – the same arguments Brunell makes against I-1631.

In short, no carbon tax exists that Brunell could support because he simply does not support actual, real carbon taxes and only raises other carbon taxes as a means to undermine the current proposals on the table.

Brunell and the AWB and Rob McKenna (Chevron employee) and the oil companies who are funding “no on I-1631” do not care about you, your family or the future of Washington state. They care about protecting their investments in dirty fossil fuels, and they care so much that they’re willing to let your child get asthma, watch peoples’ homes go up in smoke, poison the air and the earth, let the seas swamp historic Washington towns, and let famines and disasters kill millions of people around the world.

In November, we have the chance to create something different. I-1631 reorients our economy away from fossil fuels, placing a modest, but rising fee on fossil fuels (analysis suggests that the costs per family per month are around $10). We can grow an economy that’s not based on poison, but on electrification, clean energy, high tech and balancing our relationship with nature.

In short, there’s a future worth having. Don’t let the oil company profits and their paid stooges keep us from it.

– Nathan Schumer