O.C. Legislators Resist Tax Hike to Rebuild L.A.

Voicing more sympathy for taxpayers than for riot-ravaged Los Angeles, most Orange County lawmakers said Tuesday that they will oppose any temporary sales tax increase to help rebuild areas destroyed after the Rodney G. King verdicts.

Local senators and Assembly members said they preferred using redevelopment districts and enterprise zones--with special incentives for business--to help attract companies and jobs to South Los Angeles, where vandals, arsonists and looters destroyed nearly 5,300 buildings and caused an estimated $785 million in damage.

With the possible exception of one freshman Assembly member, local legislators said they would “absolutely” vote against a proposal by Sen. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles) to help pay for reconstruction by raising the state sales tax by one-quarter cent for a year.

If passed, Torres’ proposal would increase Orange County’s sales tax from 7 3/4 to 8 cents.

“Essentially, I felt those people did what they did voluntarily, and to bail them out is to invite them to do it again,” Assemblyman Nolan Frizzelle (R-Fountain Valley) said about the rioters.

“Where we put the money is where we put the . . . incentive,” Frizzelle added. “They can get state money simply out of rioting. They can get state money by burning. They can get reduced loan rates. Why wouldn’t they do it again?”

Added Sen. Frank Hill (R-Whittier), whose district also includes Mission Viejo, Irvine, Yorba Linda, Placentia, Lake Forest, Laguna Hills and Brea:

“I’m not going to ask my constituents to bail out a bunch of people who had nothing to do with politics and social unrest. It was nothing other than hoods, gang members and other assorted slime of the earth. It’s their problem. They brought it upon themselves.”

“Edward James Olmos and Jesse Jackson can figure out a way to solve it . . . ,” said Hill, referring to the actor and civil rights leader who have taken high-profile roles in the clean-up effort.

Hill said Torres’ sales-tax request could galvanize the anti-Los Angeles sentiment that often lurks beneath the surface in the Legislature, where suburban and rural lawmakers regularly find themselves outvoted by the state’s largest city.

Since the tax increase proposed by the Los Angeles senator must have a two-thirds vote of the Legislature to pass, non-Los Angeles representatives--especially suburban Republicans--are in the position to block the funding plan, said Hill.

“My guess is the (message) from L.A. will be what it has always been, and that is ‘Send more money. We’re not going to take responsibility for ourselves. Everybody else in the state of California, bail us out,’ ” Hill said.

He predicted that the legislative response will be, “L.A.’s going to have to, in the era of dwindling resources, do what every other city has done and take care of itself.”

Other delegation members cited the state’s ailing economy in opposing the temporary tax. They were Tom Mays (R-Huntington Beach), Ross Johnson (R-La Habra), Gil Ferguson (R-Newport Beach) and Tom Umberg (D-Garden Grove) in the Assembly; Marian Bergeson (R-Newport Beach), Edward R. Royce (R-Anaheim) and John R. Lewis (R-Orange) in the Senate.

“I have lots of compassion (for the people affected by the riots), but I also have equal compassion for taxpayers of our state and would hate to see floods of economic refugees leaving the state because of higher taxes,” Lewis said. “Every time we raise taxes we send another signal that California is anything other than friendly.”

Umberg voiced similar thoughts. “We lost 400,000 jobs last year and another 200,000 jobs this year. We’ve effectively burdened the economy with overtaxation and over-regulation, and we just can’t stand another tax right now while we’re in this recession. So I say, no way.”

Umberg said Los Angeles should look toward Washington--not cash-starved Sacramento--to get its “fair share” of federal tax monies in helping to rebuild the riot area. He said Southern California is already getting short shrift in federal dollars for immigration, education and transportation.

Rookie Assemblyman Mickey Conroy (R-Santa Ana), however, said he had mixed emotions about the tax proposal.

“I’m torn, basically,” Conroy said. “But my constituents have been overwhelming my local office ever since the story broke. I’ve had nobody support it (sales tax increase). They’re all saying to me natural disasters are one thing, but when you riot and loot, that’s another thing.”

Conroy said he might be moved by “basically, good compassion” to support the Torres proposal.

“But I’ve got to remember that all of the compassion in the world doesn’t elect me. I came here on the platform that I would do the people’s wishes. If that’s what they wish, that’s what they wish.”

Assemblywoman Doris Allen (R-Cypress) said she was “undecided” about the temporary sales tax, adding that she wants to see how it would be spent before making up her mind.

Allen said she might be persuaded to vote for the increase if it funded a “plan that would deal with the underlying problems as well as the immediacy of the destruction” in South Los Angeles.

In particular, she said, any remedial plan should include “applied academics,” where students having difficulty with abstract subjects such as algebra could receive graduation credits by applying the material to vocational subjects such as electronics.

A spokesman for Torres said Tuesday that the proposed sales-tax increase, which would be considered in a special session, would raise between $700 million and $800 million.

He said the Los Angeles Democrat wants to split the proceeds by investing two-thirds in the riot area and the remainder in rebuilding structures and roads ruined by the recent earthquake near Eureka.