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By SUSAN M. COVER
Staff Writer Monday, July 16, 2007

Within the next few weeks, the Maine Heritage Policy Center will post on its Web site a revised measure that will be made available to groups for model legislation or a new citizen initiative, said Bill Becker, president and chief executive officer of the center, a conservative think tank in Portland.

"We're not heading in the right direction," he said, noting a Forbes Magazine ranking that downgraded Maine from 46th to 48th in the nation in a survey of the best places to do business.

In November, voters rejected the original version of the measure, called TABOR, by a 54 percent to 46 percent margin.

That measure sought to limit increases in state and local government spending to the rate of inflation plus population growth, and would have required voter approval for tax and fee increases.

Opponents said the proposal was too severe, and would have caused cuts in services.

Since November's defeat, the policy center has been talking to business people, tax policy experts, lawmakers and trade associations about ways to change the language to make it work in Maine, he said.

"We've got the expertise and the horsepower to take the best of the last version as model legislation and offer it again, and people can do with it as they please," he said.

That could include another group picking up the mantle and organizing a petition drive to get the measure on the November 2008 ballot, he said.

Or they might take parts of it and incorporate it into their own plan.

"Limiting spending is fundamental to improving the Maine economy," Becker said.

At the same time, a citizens group called Maine Taxpayers United is seeking to expand its membership and get involved in a serious way with the tax debate.

Led by Jack Wibby of Gray, the group wants to educate Maine citizens on the issue of taxes and is poised to support any plan they think will achieve the goal of lowering the tax burden.

Wibby decided to morph his old group, Citizens Alliance of Maine, into a more active body that plans to make its presence known at the Statehouse.

He described the alliance as mostly an e-mail network of 177 people.

The new group is looking to form regional offshoots so people in all parts of the state can participate in the tax discussion, he said.

Wibby said he watched with interest as lawmakers worked on tax policy for several months earlier this year.

In the end, a proposal to lower income taxes, extend the sales tax to more services, and put more money in tax cut programs for homeowners and the poor, failed.

"Our goal is tax reduction," Wibby said. "Our mission is to educate Maine voters."

Although lawmakers failed to pass a measure this year, Gov. John Baldacci said he will bring forward his own tax reduction plan for consideration by lawmakers when they return in January.

"Any tax reform has to take seriously the idea of tax relief as well," said David Farmer, spokesman for Baldacci. "Work is going on on tax reform. We're having conversations about how to proceed."

Another group, the Portland Regional Chamber, is interested in seeing a plan come forward that lowers the tax burden in Maine to the national average within 10 years, said Chris Hall, senior vice president of the chamber.

Maine has the second-highest state and local tax burden in the country, according to the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan tax research group based in Washington D.C. The burden in Maine is 14 percent, compared to the U.S. average of 11 percent.

A major part of any plan has to be spending limits, he said.

"Spending restraint at every level of government is a powerful tool without getting into horrible fights about what do we want to cut," he said. "We want to cut spending."

From his perspective, Hall said if the state puts as much effort into tax cuts as it did into increasing the state's share of school funding to 55 percent, the goal of lowering taxes is achievable.

In June 2004, voters approved a measure put forward by the Maine Municipal Association calling for the state to put more money into local education. Since then, the state has pumped millions of new dollars in education money into local districts.

"You can harness the power of revenue growth and make the priority lowering taxes," Hall said.

Once the burden is lowered, it then becomes easier to reform the system by extending the sales tax to other services and lowering the income tax, Hall said.

Wibby said his group probably won't lead the charge of a taxpayer revolt, but they'd like to be part of it.

"If another edition of TABOR comes along, we will most likely support it," he said.

"When it goes to the Statehouse, we're going to make our presence felt."

Susan Cover -- 623-1056
scover@centralmaine.com

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