Car tax a test for Schwarzenegger

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger may have trouble keeping his promise to roll back the tripling of California's car tax, at least amid current budget woes.

Any cut in the tax would need legislative approval, and help from the Democrat-controlled Legislature isn't likely.

"The short answer is he can't do it on his own," said Floyd Shimomura, chief counsel for the state Department of Finance.

The tax has been around since 1936 and generates about $6-billion a year for local governments when fully levied.

The increase, triggered on June 20 by Davis administration officials to help ease a $38.2-billion budget deficit, raised the average car fee from $76 a year to $234 a year.

The increase raised the tax to the level it was before lawmakers and former Gov. Pete Wilson approved a series of cuts that slashed motorists' bills in 1998. The cuts included a provision allowing officials to raise the tax again without another vote of the Legislature when the state faced a financial crisis.

To compensate for the cut, which went to local governments, the state subsidized those governments to make up the difference.

Rolling back the increase would cost local governments about $4.2-billion a year and mean cuts in police, firefighting and other services, city and county leaders say.

To cut motorists' tax bills when he takes office next month, Schwarzenegger will either have to persuade lawmakers to cut the tax rate or pare other programs to generate enough money to resume the local government subsidies, Shimomura said.

This isn't the only campaign pledge Schwarzenegger may have trouble keeping. He also is likely to face a clash in attempting to repeal a new law that allows undocumented immigrants to get driver's licenses, despite exit polls indicating about 70 percent of voters in California's recall election disapproved of the law.

PUNCH CARD PROBLEMS: More than 380,000 ballots cast in the recall election did not have a valid vote on whether to recall Gov. Gray Davis, and most of them were made on punch card systems, according to two studies. But even if the 4.6 percent of Californians whose ballots did not answer the recall question had voted against it, Davis would have lost.

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