Scott warns of a tax increase

BURBANK — Taxes will have to be raised to avert a looming budget crisis and save California’s schools, state Sen. Jack Scott told representatives from local school boards Friday in Burbank.

The state budget, with its nearly $8-billion hole and possible $4.4-billion cut to education, was one of the main topics at Friday’s meeting of the Five Star Education Coalitioncomprising school districts from Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, South Pasadena and Pasadena — which works to shape state and federal education policy.

“We have a serious budget problem, and there is no choice but to raise taxes,” Scott said. “If we’re unwilling to pay taxes, we’re willing to cut money from schools. There is no good solution here.”

Scott, a Democrat whose district includes Glendale and Burbank, did not specify what tax hike he would support, but he mentioned a half-cent increase to the sales tax, an increase in communal property taxes, tacking on taxes to lawyers’ fees or a repeal of a recently defeated piece of state legislation that closed the “yacht loophole,” which allowed wealthy residents to avoid paying sales taxes for their yachts and airplanes if stored away for three months.

“That would have saved us $2.6 billion,” he said of the so-called yacht tax.

Scott’s call for increased state taxes comes amid ongoing negotiations to balance the state budget and three months after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told Californians about the $14.5-billion budget gap.

Lawmakers have since proposed $7.4 billion in cuts to areas such as healthcare, education and public safety that significantly reduced the state’s deficit.

But it would be difficult to cut additional programs from the state budget, as lawmakers are resistant to slash funds from public safety and healthcare, leaving a $4.4-billion education budget hole and evoking the reality that achieving a balanced budget will likely be realized by taxing Californians, Scott said.

Some at the meeting decried raising taxes as a stopgap measure, hoping legislators would instead seek a long-term solution to a problem they said has continually plagued California.