Tax Plan Has 2 Backers, 2 Maybes Among Area Representatives : Economy: Reps. Waters and Tucker praise prospect for more inner-city jobs. Harman withholds opinion and Horn sees some good, some bad in it.

The South Bay congressional delegation’s reaction to President Clinton’s economic speech last week split along partisan lines with a notable exception: Rep. Jane Harman (D-Marina del Rey) was not as enthusiastic as her fellow Democrats about raising taxes on the rich, a key component of her constituency.

For the most part, all four Congress members who represent the South Bay found something they liked in the speech.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), whose district includes Gardena, Hawthorne and Inglewood, and Rep. Walter R. Tucker III (D-Compton), the congressman for Carson and Wilmington, praised Clinton’s plans to create more jobs in the inner city.

Harman, representing the affluent Palos Verdes Peninsula, Torrance and the beach cities, was encouraged by the President’s pledge to help workers laid off by defense and aerospace cutbacks.

Even Rep. Steve Horn (R-Long Beach), the lone GOP representative in the group and downtown San Pedro’s man in Washington, liked the rhetoric, particularly the call for campaign finance reform.

But Clinton’s speech also included something that got varying responses: tax increases for everybody making more than $30,000, with higher income families taking the biggest hit.

Clinton’s plan would raise taxes $274 billion over four years and cut spending by $223 billion.

Horn blasted the tax increase as unnecessary. Waters and Tucker embraced it, but fellow Democrat Harman did not seem as enthusiastic about it as her more liberal colleagues.

Clinton said his economic provisions, including a new energy tax, would cost a family of four earning $40,000 a year about $17 a month more in taxes.

The wealthiest 1.2% of taxpayers would pay the bulk of the tax increase, he said. Clinton proposes to raise the top tax rate from 31% to 36% for individuals making $115,000 and couples with taxable earnings of $140,000 or more. In addition, he plans a 10% surcharge on taxable income of $250,000 or more.

Those tax hikes could mean trouble for Harman, whose district includes high-income areas on the peninsula. About 57% of the people in Palos Verdes Estates, 80% in Rolling Hills and 42% in Rancho Palos Verdes earn more than $100,000. Even Torrance, where about 14% earn more than $100,000, is higher than the county average of 9%.

Will she back the tax increases?

“I am not answering that,” Harman said. “I can vote for a package but I want to be sure the package is balanced.”

Purposefully vague, Harman said she would speak with constituents--she planned to have meetings over the weekend and possibly this week--before taking a stand.

Clinton’s plan, when formally submitted to Congress, will probably undergo revisions, despite his pleas to the contrary.

Harman said she could vote for a tax increase, depending on what it entailed. “This congresswoman will do her best to be courageous,” Harman said.

“I am for tax fairness and I want to assess the bill in that sense,” she said. “We must cut federal spending and we must create good jobs. As far as the tax issue is concerned, we have to look at that in connection with achieving the other two goals.”

On top of the tax increase, Harman also is concerned about what defense cutbacks may do to the battered aerospace industry, the linchpin of the South Bay’s economy.

Harman said she was heartened by the President’s promise to “provide special assistance to areas and to workers displaced by cuts in the defense budget and by other unavoidable economic dislocations.”

“I want to be sure that retraining and a lot of technology programs . . . will help California business revive and grow and help aerospace diversify,” Harman said.

Tucker and Waters both said they support the President’s plan outright, arguing that the tax increases it entails are worthwhile to help poorer communities.

Tucker and Waters also cheered Clinton’s proposals for youth, public works and job training programs, and a $1-billion infusion for enterprise zones.

The economic plan, Waters said, “is tough medicine to swallow but at some point in time all of us are going to have to participate in restoring this economy.”

Clinton “will reduce the deficit by cutting programs and entitlements, and to help pay for it he has in the fairest way possible asked Americans who have the most and have not paid their fair share to pay for the lion’s share of this program,” Waters said.

Tucker said he would fight for urban programs promoted in Clinton’s plan.

“There is real pain and a real need in our country for economic reinvigoration and economic fairness,” Tucker said. “If we don’t pay today we are going to pay in hundreds of millions of dollars in relief and recovery for the riots and destruction in our communities. That prospect is real and an ever-present danger.”

Waters said she would wait to hear from constituents before suggesting any changes in the plan, although she could not think of anything right away. “I am going to do what the President asked us to do and not pick it apart,” she said.

Tucker too found nothing wrong with the proposals, saying, “I generally am in support of the plan.” Full support, he said, would come if California and depressed areas of his district get “fair distribution of the money.”

Horn’s views coincided with other GOP members of Congress, who contend that Clinton won’t cut enough government waste.

“Instead of concentrating on cutting programs and eliminating wasteful spending we are given a diet of taxes,” Horn said.

Horn also worried that California would share a disproportionate burden of the proposed $71.4-billion energy tax, which will be based on the heat content of fuels such as petroleum, natural gas, coal and home heating oil.

“We have got a lot of people who drive a lot in our district,” Horn said.

Clinton said he has proposed 150 spending cuts and challenged critics who believe it is not enough to come up with their own plans for specific cuts. Horn retorted, “When I see his specific cuts I would be glad to tell you if I agree and where additional ones could be made.”

Horn said there are about 100 outdated programs that Congress regularly renews that should be given a second look.

Yet Horn would not rule out tax increases to some degree.

“Philosophically, I have got to say at this point my emphasis is on cutting government spending first, seeing where you are, seeing what else you can do; and when you have seriously done that, then you see what other options you have,” he said.