RICHMOND, Va. (AP) _ A national tax-relief organization endorsed Republican Mark Earley on Tuesday, claiming his Democratic opponent's support for a transportation tax referendum amounts to a plan to raise taxes.
The National Taxpayers Union Campaign Fund said it backs Earley because he opposes Internet taxes and has promised to veto legislation allowing a northern Virginia referendum on a local tax increase to finance improved roads.
The NTUCF is the political arm of the National Taxpayers Union.
NTUCF president John Berthoud also praised Earley's commitment to fully phase out the local taxes imposed statewide on personal automobiles, despite a severe downturn in state revenue collections last month and projections for a continued economic slide.
``Mark Earley supports wholeheartedly the phaseout of the hated car tax here in Virginia and now his opponent is equivocating and that is certainly a troubling sign,'' Berthoud said.
Warner has said he would attempt to complete the phaseout in four years if elected, but at a pace the state's economy can sustain.
House and Senate budget leaders said a freeze in the car tax cuts is likely after reports last week that state tax collections had dropped by 8.4 percent last month and were down 2.4 percent for July through September, the first quarter of the 2002 fiscal year.
The 1998 car tax cut law requires that state revenue growth exceed estimates for each of four incremental cuts in the tax to proceed. The cuts advanced from 55 percent of the full tax bill this year to 70 percent, and the phaseout is scheduled to reach 100 percent next July.
Earley made Warner's $2.25 billion transportation proposal a target the day Warner publicly outlined it. Forty percent of the revenue for Warner's plan would come from a one-half cent sales tax increase in several northern Virginia localities provided voters approved it.
Two weeks before election day, Earley was emphasizing the tax issue again, days after a survey by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research found that 55 percent of voters polled in northern Virginia support a referendum but 51 percent said they would vote against increased taxes if the referendum is held.
Initially, Earley had left open the possibility of agreeing to the referendum. In August, he sought and received clarification from ATR's national leader, Grover Norquist, that support for the transportation referendum would not breach that pledge.
Earley argued that seeking Norquist's blessing for agreeing to a tax referendum is different from Warner's position.
``The initiative and the referendum in itself are not equated with a tax increase,'' Earley said. ``The difference is that Mark Warner counts the money from a tax increase in his plan, therefore he clearly wants that money from a tax increase,'' Earley said.
In an Oct. 3 debate, Earley appeared to slam the door on a referendum, saying in that in the current troubled economy, ``I'd veto that bill in a heartbeat.''
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^On the Web
Earley campaign: http://www.markearley.com/
Warner campaign: http://www.markwarner2001.org/
This endorsement comes as no surprise, but it's like Wilder endorsing Warner; NOT getting it would be bigger news.
My question: is Earley saying that he'll support the full phase-out of the car-tax next year with the knowledge that the revenue shortfalls are likely to be so large that there's no chance it can be done? That would be a win-win strategy in my book. Earley can't be unconscious of the fact that even the Gilmore supporters in the Virginia House who helped sustain the budget impasse say it's impossible to finish the car-tax repeal next year.