By Howard Fischer
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/knau/local-knau-850586.mp3
Phoenix, AZ – Governor Jan Brewer says she's willing to accept a Democratic
demand to let the state property tax return in exchange for their
votes to put her sales tax hike on the ballot.
Brewer has made that sales tax hike -- and the billion dollars a
year it would raise -- a central point of her plan to balance the
budget for the next three years. Many Republicans are opposed to
any sort of tax hike, even one referred to voters. And so far
Democrats have been unwilling to support it. One reason is they
say it's not fair to hike taxes on consumers while helping
businesses with a permanent repeal of the state property tax.
Brewer said she's absolutely willing to make a deal with them.
(We need to discuss how we're going to solve the problem. And if
that's part of the options that we need to discuss, as it was
prior, we will discuss it again. But we need to get it resolved
and we need to get it resolved quickly.)
But Brewer sidestepped the question of whether raising both the
sales tax and allowing the currently suspended property tax to
return amounts to double taxation.
(Well, right now I'm not going to explain it because it's not
doing that. Certainly, like we said, when you start negotiating
any kind of budget, everything comes on the table. You talk about
it. You get an agreement. And you determine how it's going to
work and how it's going to affect the budget overall.)
And Brewer said the amount of taxes to be raised, from whatever
source, will be linked to the amount needed to balance the
budget.