44

STATEMENT ON STATE PROPERTY TAX RATE

January 30, 1967

Some of the news interpretations of my budget message to the Mary-
land General Assembly last Friday have created a great deal of con-
fusion which I feel compelled to clarify. There were prominently dis-
played headlines that I was urging an increase in the State property
tax.

Compounding the public misunderstanding has been a statement
by the Comptroller over the weekend challenging information put
out by his own office.

First, I would like to make it emphatically clear that I have not
proposed any increase in the State property tax. The amount of this
levy is mandated by law each year and is not determined by the
Governor. The rate is dependent solely on the amount of debt service
required during the fiscal year for bonds that were issued by previous
administrations.

Secondly, I have emphasized repeatedly — during the campaign
and since taking office — that a major goal of this administration will
be to relieve, rather than increase, the tax burden on property owners.
That is one of the main reasons for the fiscal reform program now
being developed.

The reference to the State property tax rate in the budget* was a
customary part of the message and was reprinted word for word from
information supplied to the Budget Bureau by Mr. Bernard F. Nossel,
Chief Deputy Comptroller of Maryland. It is therefore incongruous
that the Comptroller, Mr. Louis L. Goldstein, should now be "dis-
agreeing" with that information.

It was stated at my budget briefing with the press that the estimates
on which the 2-cent tax increase was projected will be subject to re-
view by the Board of Public Works in May, and that it is possible
that there will be an upward revision of the estimates eliminating any
need for a tax increase.

*Printed in the explanatory detail following the Governor's mes-
sage. See Budget Message of Governor Spiro T. Agnew to the General
Assembly of Maryland and the Budget in Brief (Annapolis, January
27, 1967), p. 80. — Ed.