Legal News

Leave taxes alone, say prominent LA sheriff and prosecutor

By Richard Binder

Lee Baca, sheriff of Los Angeles County, joined with police officers to ask state legislators to refrain from using property taxes to balance the state's 24-billion-dollar budget.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has said he may borrow local property and gas tax revenues to close a budget shortfall that has put the state on the brink of financial collapse. The governor may also suspend Proposition 42 payments to cities. The voter-approved measure requires that taxes on the sale of motor vehicle fuel be used for public transportation, city and county road repairs and state highway improvements. The state government is required to repay cities -- with interest -- for the borrowed property tax revenues within three years. But no such protection exists for the Proposition 42 payments.

District Attorney Steve Cooley, Los Angeles County's top prosecutor, said that California's financial troubles have been years in the making, and it is time for state lawmakers to establish a core mission.

Full story here.

Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on June 15, 2009 (boomark / email).