David R. Baldinger wants taxpayers in Schuylkill County and elsewhere in Pennsylvania to join him in an effort to eliminate school property taxes permanently.
"This is as close to a taxpayer initiative as you're going to get," Baldinger, Reading, said Tuesday in an interview with The Republican-Herald Editorial Board. "This is our legislation."
Baldinger is a spokesman for the Pennsylvania Coalition of Taxpayer Associations, a nonpartisan alliance of 76 local groups that are pushing for an end to what they believe is the unconstitutional and outdated system of using property taxes to fund the Keystone State's schools.
"What we have lacked in the past was a real grassroots component," state Sen. David Argall, R-29, said of the effort to eliminate school property taxes.
The coalition is campaigning for passage of the Property Tax Independence Act, as proposed in House Bill 1776 and Senate Bill 1400. Although the bills stalled in committees during the 2012 legislative session, each will be reintroduced in January.
Under the proposed legislation, the state income tax would be increased to 4.34 percent from 3.07 percent, and the state sales tax would be raised to 7 percent from 6 percent and cover more goods and services. Proponents say that according to the analysis by the state Independent Fiscal Office, those increases would exactly compensate for the lost revenues.
"(It's a) dollar for dollar replacement for every school district," Baldinger said. "Whatever the school district loses ... they'll get right back again."
Baldinger said the continuation of school property taxes would be terrible for Pennsylvania.
"It's a great burden for small business. It's going to be totally unsustainable for homeowners as well as for small business," Baldinger said.
Argall and Berks County state Rep. Jim Cox, R-129, who were each re-elected Nov. 6, are the prime sponsors of the Senate and House bills.
"There has been traditionally a lack of political courage," Argall said in explaining why such measures have not succeeded in the past.
However, with reassessments generating controversy in the state's two most populous counties, Philadelphia and Allegheny, there might be more support for the legislation, according to Argall.
"They now start to understand our pain a little bit," he said.
The legislation also would limit increases in school budgets to the rate of inflation, Baldinger said. While it would stop school boards from raising taxes at will, it would allow them to impose an earned income tax for special projects for a specified time that could not exceed four years, Baldinger said.
Some groups, most notably the Pennsylvania State Education Association and the Pennsylvania School Boards Association, are opposing the proposal, Baldinger said.
"The special interests were out in full force" to stop the legislation, Baldinger said.
Argall said opponents do not always have specific reasons for their positions.
"Some of it's just fear of change," he said. "This is a complete revamp."
While he would not mind ending all property taxes, Baldinger said the coalition is focusing on school property taxes because they are the largest chunk of them and that the thousands of municipalities across Pennsylvania have different requirements.
Argall said that municipalities have strict ceilings on the amounts of taxes they can levy.
Baldinger said approximately 10,000 families lose their homes in Pennsylvania every year due to property taxes, and the state should not allow that to continue.
"The best thing we can do for this state is to get rid of the property tax altogether," he said.
Argall agreed that eliminating school property taxes would benefit everyone, especially senior citizens.
"It's an unfair tax, it's an archaic tax, it's a hated tax," he said.