ASHCROFT SAYS NOT TO PROPOSAL

Gov. John Ashcroft is encouraging Missouri House members to reject a massive tax increase package they are debating, and instead adopt a smaller $150 million package proposed by a group of House Republicans.

Ashcroft said the smaller plan, which includes some basic education reforms, would be a better substitute for Senate Bill 353, which has a $462 million tax package, instead of one proposed by Speaker Bob Griffin that has been amended to the point of being nearly a $750 million tax increase.

The governor said if the smaller plan is adopted as a substitute, then it would be easier to find a reasonable middle ground in a House-Senate conference committee.

Ashcroft, at a press conference at the Cape Girardeau Airport Friday afternoon, blasted the ballooning substitute bill still being debated by representatives as "exorbitant," and charged it fails to provide the kind of reforms needed for Missouri schools.

"Under this ill-conceived bill, a typical Missouri working couple would have to pay a whopping 46 percent increase in state income taxes," the governor said. The 46 percent increase would apply to a working couple with no children with a family income of $45,000, he said.

Eighty percent of the tax revenue proposed in the bill on the House floor would come from personal income taxes. That kind of increase would move Missouri to 15th in the nation in individual income taxes collected per citizen, Ashcroft said, "putting us at a decided disadvantage with our neighboring states. It will make it doubly difficult to attract needed new jobs and industries.

"The hastily constructed, monumental tax increase is targeted at Missouri's already tax-battered middle class," said the governor.

"Our families can't afford this. They already have been hit by inflation, recession, and higher federal taxes. These are hardly the conditions that pave the way for the largest tax increase in the history of this state."

Ashcroft, who has been steadfast in his opposition to a tax increase and has said he would consider one for education only if it included meaningful reforms, pledged his support for a tax plan that "offers meaningful education reforms at an affordable price."

Legislative leaders have agreed there would be little chance of getting voters to approve a tax increase for education without Ashcroft's active support.

The governor said he believes there is still plenty of time to get something passed this year. He said there has been plenty of debate on education reform this session, beginning with his annual address to the General Assembly in January.

"Make no mistake about it: I'm for helping education and I'm for helping our teachers," said Ashcroft. "I would support, and Missourians would approve, I believe, a reform proposal that offers meaningful education reforms at an affordable price. But this current $750 million bill should be scrapped in favor of a reform-oriented, workable proposal."

Ashcroft said anything lawmakers send the people to consider must be dominated by "responsibility and reason."

Sending the people a tax plan that is massive and without reforms, Ashcroft said, would set back for many years any opportunity to provide new resources for schools and universities.

The governor said he is sure voters would show their displeasure for this tax plan at the polls.

"I think the time to act is now to put ourselves back into the context of rationality and realism, where we have the possibility of getting reforms in the system and providing realistic funding for the reform," said Ashcroft.

"I don't think people are going to line up and pay more taxes to get business as usual in our educational community. I do think citizens are willing to improve our educational effort, but to spend massive amounts of money and not get reform is not within the reasonability and mentality of Missouri citizens. They know better than that."

Ashcroft also threatened to use the initiative petition route to put a reform proposal on the ballot if the legislature approved something he did not feel was reasonable.

"I know how to get things on the ballot; I've done it before," said Ashcroft.

The governor said he would be very pleased to work with legislators for better quality and value. "But I am not desperate to the point of being willing to make a settlement, which is nothing more than a tax increase that does not result in an improvement in our education system."

Last year the governor was not satisfied with the type of ethics bill passed by the legislature and he urged his supporters and used his campaign funds to help finance a petition drive to have an ethics amendment put on the ballot. Later, the amendment was declared unconstitutional when the state Supreme Court ruled it addressed too many topics.

Asked whether he was seriously considering some type of petition effort for education reform, the governor replied, "That is an option that remains open to us."

He said, "I'm willing to work constructively to get the right reforms in the conference committee." He said those reforms include things to "elevate the performance of our system. If you look at performance, that means we are interested in our students. Ultimately what we have got to do is prepare students who are more capable of competing worldwide than the kind of students we are turning out now. We can do a better job. We must do a better job."

Among the reforms for higher education Ashcroft is seeking are focusing on priorities with each university having a mission statement and the Coordinating Board on Higher Education being authorized to reduce duplication of programs; student assessment programs; additional funding linked to performance, and acquiring new technology equipment and maintaining capital investments.

Reforms for elementary and secondary education would include a revision in the foundation formula; alternative teacher certification; tests for high school graduates; more days in the classroom; school report cards; school choice; and further developing the Parents as Partners Program.