Sheriffs Drop Opposition to Tobacco Tax

Law enforcement officials have surprised the tobacco industry by withdrawing their opposition to Proposition 99 and criticizing ads that claim the tobacco tax initiative would encourage serious crime.

The California State Sheriffs’ Assn. inflicted perhaps the most damage when its executive board, meeting Thursday in Sacramento, voted unanimously to drop its opposition and take a neutral position on the Nov. 8 ballot measure.

At the same time, Sacramento Police Chief John Kearns and Lt. Blake Koller, president of the Sacramento Police Officers Assn., jointly blasted anti-99 ads as “ridiculous,” “grossly inaccurate” and “completely false.”

‘Confused’ by Study

Tobacco industry spokesmen scrambled to control the damage, suggesting the lawmen are “confused” by a study in which Atty. Gen. John K. Van de Kamp reports higher cigarette taxes do not promote smuggling, as the tobacco industry ads claim.

At issue is a proposal to increase the state excise tax on cigarettes to 35 cents a pack from 10 cents. In addition, it would impose a new equivalent tax on cigars, chewing tobacco, pipe tobacco and snuff, none of which are now taxed.

Money raised by the increased taxes would be used for tobacco-related disease research, health care for the poor and other projects, including new parks and recreation facilities.

Opponents of the tax, chiefly the tobacco industry, allege in breathless TV commercials that criminals, including drug-dealing street gangs, would realize a bonanza by buying low-tax cigarettes in other states and smuggling them into California for sale at a profit.

That assumption has been cast in doubt not only by Van de Kamp but also by a 1985 congressional study that said stiff new federal laws against interstate smuggling effectively took the profit out of cigarette smuggling in the United States.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Sherman Block said that after “extensive presentations” by both sides, along with additional research by individual sheriffs, the sheriffs’ group voted to spike its earlier opposition to the tax increase and declare itself neutral.

“There may be some crime problem associated with (Proposition 99), but we do not see any major crime problem,” Block told the Associated Press.

Kearns and Koller were even more direct.

“As a law enforcement officer, I’m personally offended by the blatantly false and misleading information used by opponents of this proposition,” said Kearns, who took time off from his job to make his remarks. “Insinuating that organized crime, gangs and murder are attributed to this proposition is completely false.”

Koller told the Associated Press that it would be “grossly inaccurate to imply that Proposition 99 will result in any increase in crime of any kind.”

Jeff Raimundo, a spokesman for Californians Against Unfair Tax Increases, a tobacco industry campaign committee opposing Proposition 99, said the sheriffs were “somewhat confused by John Van de Kamp’s so-called study and report.”

The attorney general’s study--actually a series of intra-office memos--summarizes interviews with officials in other states that have increased their cigarette taxes beyond the level of neighboring states.

A cover memo concludes: “In essence, what the pro-tax people are saying is absolutely correct.”