By John Lyon
Arkansas News Bureau
LITTLE ROCK — The executive director of the Democratic Party of Arkansas urged bipartisan support Monday for a proposed cigarette tax increase to fund health programs.
“Health care is not a partisan issue,” party director Maria Hatta during a state Capitol news conference for Gov. Mike Beebe’s proposal to raise the state’s cigarette tax by 56 cents a pack to fund a statewide trauma system and other health care initiatives.
She admonished state lawmakers not to “put partisanship above health care.”
A single sitting GOP legislator attended — Rep. Rick Green, R-Van Buren.
Green’s wife, former Rep. Mary Beth Green, and Richard Bearden, former executive director of the state Republican Party, also were on hand.
Rick Green did not speak during the event. He said later he believes Beebe’s proposal ultimately will get some GOP votes, though he could not name any other Republican legislators who support it now.
“I think there’s some that are concerned about what the people in their district think, and they’re talking to those people now,” he said. “I think there’s some that are still weighing out the evidence, which I did early on, that it’s something we’ve just got to do as a state.”
Beebe’s proposal, contained in House Bill 1024 by Rep. Gregg Reep, D-Warren, would raise the cigarette tax and change the way smokeless tobacco products are taxed to generate an estimated $88 million annually for a trauma system and other health-related programs.
Reep said Monday he hopes to present the bill in the House Rules Committee on Wednesday. If it gets through the committee, the bill could be on the House floor as early as Thursday.
A three-fourths majority vote in both chambers is needed to raise the cigarette tax, which means it will need the support of at least 75 House members. Republicans control 28 of the House’s 100 seats.
House Speaker Robbie Wills, D-Conway, said Monday he believes support among Republicans will grow.
“I think we’re going to get there,” he said.
Rep. Ed Garner, R-Maumelle, has filed a rival bill, HB 1238, that would increase court fees for people convicted of driving while intoxicated and other offenses and divert part of the state’s insurance premium tax to pay for a trauma system. Garner’s bill would not fund the other programs in Beebe’s proposal.
Garner said Monday he had just submitted an amendment to correct a typo in his bill, so the bill will not be ready to present in committee this week. The bill has been assigned to the House Committee on Public Health, Welfare and Labor.
Garner said he agrees that funding a trauma system should be a nonpartisan issue, but “when the government has a surplus of between $200 million and $300 million and you’re in a recession and you’re raising a tax for government to increase its spending, that’s not something Republicans support.”
Former U.S. House Majority Leader Dick Armey, head of the anti-tax group FreedomWorks, is scheduled to hold a news conference at the state Capitol at 10 a.m. Tuesday to speak against raising the cigarette tax.
The Step Up Coalition, a group pushing for passage of the measure, challenged Armey to a public debate on the issue, but Armey declined, citing a tight schedule, according to Step Up spokesman Robert McLarty.
McLarty said state Surgeon General Joe Thompson, who would have faced off with Armey in the debate, will still speak at the Capitol after Armey’s news conference.
