Bolling To Kaine: Don't End Tax Breaks

 

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) - Conservative legislative leaders have sent Democratic Gov. Tim Kaine a letter warning him not to end some tax breaks in the budget he submits next week.

The two-page letter from Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, two Senate Republicans, the House speaker and the conservative independent who heads the House Appropriations Committee says a tax increase would be "counterproductive at best."

Kaine has said he will try for a second year in a row to eliminate the "dealer discount," a sliver of the state sales tax retailers keep for collecting and remitting the state tax.

He is considering reversing the 1998 phaseout of the hated state tax on personal cars and pickup trucks, but has not committed to proposing it.