MISSOURI'S STEALTH TAX ON HORIZON; CITIES, COUNTIES AWAIT COURT RULING

It might be called Missouri's stealth tax since it went into effect July 1 with a minimum of publicity or fanfare. The latest in a seemingly endless string of tax hikes is a brand new levy known as a local use tax.

Unless the tax is declared unconstitutional in a pending court case, more than 600 cities in the state will begin to receive its proceeds by September. The levy is a 1.5 percent use tax which will be added to the present state use tax rate of 4.225 percent of purchases.

Enacted by the General Assembly in 1991, and signed last year by Gov. John Ashcroft, the higher rate did not become effective until the first of this month. It's now being challenged in Cole County Circuit Court by Associated Industries, and arguments were heard June 26.

No Missouri city or county had the right to impose a local use tax prior to the passage of House Bill 25. Bill sponsors argued at the time that the gap between sales and use tax schedules created an incentive to purchase goods out of state rather than from Missouri vendors. Thus the increase of 1.5 percent that went into effect the first of July.

Department of Revenue officials say it's hard to get a good estimate on how much additional revenue will begin to flow into municipal and county coffers as a result of the new levy, warning that these jurisdictions should not sell the family farm in anticipation of huge amounts. But for many cash-pinched cities and counties, anything will be welcome. State officials are saying as little as possible about the new levy until it's constitutionality is upheld or struck down in circuit court.

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EDUCATION ENROLLMENT: By now you've probably read every word of every candidate's platform, particularly the portion dealing with how to improve public education in the next four years. In case this is still on your list of things to do, suffice it to say that most gubernatorial candidates declare the state can fund improvements through the normal, expected growth in state revenue.

This might be possible if the rates were remaining at their traditional levels which they're not and if public school enrollments in the future would adhere to their traditional increases which according to the experts, they won't.

We don't want to rain on any candidate's plans to funnel more money into local school districts, but there's a cloud in the sky and whoever is inaugurated governor next January had better have an umbrella handy. The troubling prospect is none other than a recent projection from the National Center for Education Statistics that declares public school enrollment in this decade will increase rapidly until the year 2000, thereby throwing a monkey wrench in plans to finance educational needs with normal economic growth rates.

The NCES study says public school enrollment on a national level will go up a whopping 13 percent. While 15 states, including neighboring Iowa, Nebraska and Kentucky will experience enrollment declines, Missouri will have a 10-year hike of 9.4 percent from kindergarten through grade 12.

From 1990 through 1999, our state's kindergarten through grade 8 enrollment is expected to increase 7.3 percent, while for grades 9 through 12, the enrollment will accelerate at an even higher rate: 15.2 percent.

It's not hard to picture the problems to be encountered in districts that are already experiencing budget shortfalls, both in operating and capital improvements funds. Districts that have shown even small enrollment increases in recent years can gear themselves for much larger numbers as the decade progresses.

We doubt if any of the candidates are going to revise their education platforms to address this latest bit of information, which may help explain why John Q. Public has grown so cynical about government and those who try to run it. These "discoveries" of new crises after a politician takes office run the public's temperature up several degrees often to a boiling point.

And who can blame them?

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TERM TERMINATORS: The group known as Missourians for Limited Terms moved much closer to limiting legislative terms when they turned in more than enough signatures to place the issue on the ballot in November. Also included is a proposal to limit congressional terms if, and when, the measure is approved in a majority of other states. Current opinion polls would indicate state term limitation is virtually a done deal.