RICHMOND (AP) — Boosting taxes or tapping the state’s “rainy day” reserve fund is not the way a majority of respondents in a statewide poll want the state’s strained budget to be reconciled.
Fifty-six percent of those questioned in a Christopher Newport University survey said they prefer that the General Assembly and Gov. Tim Kaine slash state spending to offset a projected revenue shortfall.
Asked what they would cut first, 55 percent of the 700 registered voters questioned said it should be transportation funding, the legislature’s signature achievement last year.
The poll’s margin of error was plus or minus 3.7 percentage points.
The poll, reflecting growing concern for personal finances, was conducted by the university’s Center for Public Policy by phone from Jan. 8 to 10, amid bad economic news as the 2008 legislature convened. The results were announced yesterday, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 465 points before finishing the day down 128 points.
The poll’s central question about fixing the shortfall was presented to respondents as three options. Thirty-one percent favored Mr. Kaine’s proposal to pair spending cuts on some programs with supplements from the reserve fund. Nine percent favored higher taxes to cover the difference without using the rainy-day fund. Five percent didn’t know.
Mr. Kaine, a Democrat, wants legislators to draw $261 million from the rainy-day fund to help offset a projected revenue shortage of $641 million, leaving about $1 billion in the fund. He has not proposed any tax increases. He said he would consider any legislation sent to him that generates additional revenue.
Mr. Kaine’s press secretary, Gordon Hickey, said the poll is flawed because of the limited responses.
“The point is, the governor has cut $400 million already and is going to try to take money from the rainy-day fund. It’s a balanced approach and what he thinks is the best approach,” Mr. Hickey said.
The House’s Republican majority has been resolute against either rainy-day fund use or new taxes. House Speaker William J. Howell said yesterday, however, that if the nation’s economy continues to suffer and aggravates the state’s revenue problem, using the reserves could become necessary. But cuts, he said, should be made first.
“It doesn’t have to be draconian cuts. I was impressed with the way the governor found $350 million in cuts so quickly and a lot of it was by renegotiating Medicaid rates. I think there’s more of that we can do,” said Mr. Howell, Stafford Republican.
In an extraordinary memo to top House and Senate budget writers last week, Mr. Kaine cited weakness in key state tax collections through last month and warned of a “need to consider budget adjustments” if the discouraging results persist this month.
Senate Majority Leader Richard L. Saslaw dismissed the poll, particularly the finding that most respondents would cut transportation funding first. After years of an impasse over transportation funding, the House and Senate agreed last year on a nearly $1 billion package of regional and statewide funding for roads, rails and transit, the first substantial boost in 21 years.
“What do you expect? Ask people if they want their taxes cut, and sure, 58 or whatever percent will agree with it,” said Mr. Saslaw, Fairfax Democrat, who last week introduced a bill to boost the state’s per-gallon gasoline tax by 1 cent a year over five years.
“Should we run the state by polls? You’ve got to do what you think is right, and we can’t wait until we’re driving around on chewed-up roads,” he said.
Forty-one percent favored cutting social services first, and 27 percent said public safety should be pared first.
Other poll findings showed that slim majorities backed denying all government services to illegal aliens, including children, and allowing police to stop and check the status of drivers they suspect to be in the country illegally. By wider majorities, respondents rejected splitting up families of illegal aliens through deportations or denying them care in hospital emergency rooms.
The strongest result reflected in the poll is for relocating the authority to redraw state congressional and legislative districts every decade into the hands of an independent, bipartisan commission. Seventy-three percent agreed with that approach.
In Virginia, redistricting always has been handled by the General Assembly, with the party in charge tailoring districts most to their advantage. The next reapportionment is in 2011, a constitutional requirement to reflect statewide changes in population.
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