Smokers May See a Less Taxing Year Ahead

Smokers still fuming over the new ban on their habit in bars can breathe a temporary sigh of relief knowing an initiative to add a 50-cent tax on a pack of smokes has been snuffed out.

Backers of the so-called After-School Tutoring Initiative have stopped collecting the 433,000 signatures needed to put the measure on the June ballot.

The initiative was supposed to raise $800 million for programs to keep children out of gangs, and was intended to take advantage of the same anti-tobacco sentiment that helped ban smoking in bars.

The tax was to increase to 60 cents in 2008.

But backers--led by Assemblyman Bob Hertzberg (D-Sherman Oaks) and Los Angeles Recreation and Parks Commissioner Steve Soboroff--said they halted the effort after collecting about 200,000 signatures.

Smokers, however, should hold off lighting the victory cigar.

Hertzberg said he and other initiative backers have dropped their campaign to concentrate their efforts on another 50-cent cigarette tax initiative led by actor-director Rob Reiner.

The Reiner initiative, intended for the November ballot, would raise money to fund early childhood development programs.

Reiner, who is expected to receive strong support from the entertainment industry, needs to collect 693,000 signatures by May 11.

Hertzberg said his group had no trouble collecting signatures for the after-school tutoring measure. But he said the group believed voters might not support two cigarette taxes in the same year.

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“We were just concerned that we would be competing with each other,” Hertzberg said.

The new plan, he said, is for his group to back the Reiner initiative and then reintroduce the after-school tutoring measure in 2000, proposing that cigarettes be taxed even more.

“We will assist them and they are going to assist us after the fact,” Hertzberg said.

But some political pundits say it may not be easy to breathe new life into the after-school tutoring effort in 2000. One reason is that the public may not feel as strongly about taxing tobacco products as it now does.

Recent accounts of tobacco firms suppressing information on the health hazards of their products and manipulating cigarettes’ nicotine levels to deliberately hook smokers have helped fuel anti-tobacco sentiment, political pundits agree.

Another potential problem is that the price of cigarettes may increase so much in two years that the public may hesitate to add another tax.

Lawmakers in Washington are still debating a giant tobacco deal that could substantially increase cigarette prices by as much as $1.50 per pack to pay for treatment of tobacco-related diseases.

Also, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) recently unveiled a November initiative that would add a new $1-a-pack tax on cigarettes to improve state schools. If successful, the new tax, which is backed by Mayor Richard Riordan, would raise up to $1 billion annually.

Tyrone Vahedi, the paid consultant who worked with Hertzberg on the after-school tutoring measure, conceded voters may not feel like adding another cigarette tax in 2000.

“If Feinstein’s initiative passes it will be a hard hurdle to overcome,” he said.