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February 04, 2010 | 11:48 AM
This week has seen a number of tax repeal proposals offered by representatives of the Middle Country community, and we think they deserve serious consideration.
We wholeheartedly support the rollback of the MTA payroll tax proposed by Assemblywoman Ginny Fields (D-Bayport). This disastrous charge was placed on Long Island businesses — which benefit little if at all from New York City transportation services — last year amid the worst possible economic climate. Suffolk taxpayers pay this levy several times over through their employers and the taxes handed down by schools and local governments that also fall under its jurisdiction.
As Fields argues, most other governments and public agencies recognize that the so-called Great Recession is time for belt-tightening, not increasing living costs for the already struggling Long Island population. But not the MTA — which gave its employees raises, Fields said — nor the state lawmakers that agreed to its bailout. It's time the transportation authority learns to live within its means.
The referendum on eliminating the county's 2.5 percent sales tax on home heating fuel, called for by hometown Legislator Tom Muratore and colleagues in the Republican caucus, deserves an honest debate.
Sales tax by its nature is regressive, meaning that it disproportionately affects those of lower income. Coupled with steadily escalating fuel prices and a winter season, the energy tax can significantly add to the hardship faced by disadvantaged Suffolk residents.
However, critics say, killing the energy tax without an accompanying decrease in public services would mean increasing property taxes. This county lawmakers have sought to avoid in recent decades, favoring sales tax as it catches nonresidents travelling or conducting business in Suffolk in its net, shifting some of the tax burden off residents.
The superior choice isn't apparent. Lawmakers must examine how the lowest-earning families fare under each tax model, and pursue the model which takes the least from those who can least afford it.
But that decision is their own, assumed when they sought election. They must beware the populist urge to wash their hands and turn tax choices over to a referendum.
If the fiasco that is now the State of California offers America no further upside, it is a clear lesson in the dangers of confusing a democratic republic, which we are, with a pure democracy administered by elected officials. Rather than chosen leaders, the people dominated decisions on tax law, and now the state is forced to discard services and employees, and empty its jails, with abandon.
This is not to say Suffolk residents can't be trusted to vote responsibly. But as California shows, when given the opportunity to defeat taxes, people likely will, regardless of how it cripples a government's ability to operate. (There are a few outliers, such as votes to create open space funds, where residents may support new fees because they see themselves gaining a tangible asset from their investment. Taxes that merely continue the operation of core, and so taken for granted, public services rarely are so popular.)
Suffolk must avoid California's disastrous path. Elected representatives must do their jobs, and lead.
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