Taxes fuel discontent

O'Malley's approval rating plummets in survey

By Bradley Olson | Sun reporter

January 13, 2008

Voters are profoundly dissatisfied with the $1.3 billion in tax increases passed during November's special legislative session, and a majority consider the package unfair, according to a new Sun Poll.

As a result, public approval of Gov. Martin O'Malley, a Democrat, has dropped precipitously, particularly among the blue-collar voters he says he sought to protect in crafting a solution to the state's projected budget shortfalls.

Just over a year after O'Malley won 53 percent of the vote, only 35 percent of voters approve of the way he's handled his job.

In one of the nation's most staunchly Democratic states, O'Malley's approval rating is just 8 percentage points above President Bush's rating in the same poll. O'Malley's job approval numbers are also close to 10-year lows in how Marylanders have felt about the work of their governors.

"He's given away all of his political capital on this special session," said Steven L. Raabe, president of OpinionWorks, the polling firm that conducted the survey for The Sun. "He probably needed to do it from a policy standpoint, but one could question the manner in which it was done because it has come at a great cost to his ability to lead the state."

The statewide poll, which was conducted Jan. 6-9, surveyed 904 likely voters and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

In a state where education is perennially named by residents as the most important issue, high taxes have skyrocketed to the top of voter concerns, with 28 percent identifying it as the most pressing problem.

In Sun surveys dating back 10 years, the issue of taxes has never been the top concern of more than 11 percent of voters. When asked for what they consider the second most pressing issue, another 12 percent of respondents named taxes.

The discontent comes at a time of unusual anxiety over the state's economy, with 52 percent saying they believe it is getting worse, a 33-percentage point jump since 2005 and nearly twice as high as any year since 1998.

"I'm a blue-collar worker, man. I can't afford all those taxes," said Franklin Gregg, 57, a lifelong Baltimore resident who works at an auto parts retailer and said he used to approve of O'Malley's work as mayor. Now, he said, he is thinking about leaving the state.

"With my mortgage, taxes, water bill and gas and electric, hey, I'm getting pounded here," said Gregg, who was among several poll respondents who agreed to follow-up interviews with reporters.

Among likely voters who followed the special session at least somewhat, 54 percent said they disapproved of the fiscal package, which included increases to the sales, cigarette, corporate income and car-titling taxes. The income tax was also changed to reduce rates for lower-income workers and to raise them for top earners.

O'Malley designed the tax increases and a set of spending cuts to solve a budget shortfall that had persisted through two previous gubernatorial administrations and eventually reached a projected $1.7 billion.

At the same time, O'Malley increased spending on transportation, health care and the environment, though the continuation of those programs will likely depend on whether voters approve a slot machine gambling referendum that legislators set up as part of the governor's fiscal package.

The poll found that opposition to the tax package is intense, with 39 percent of voters saying they disapproved strongly. Of the 32 percent who approved of the outcome, 20 percent did so "not so strongly."

The discontent with the tax increases was not universal. Some voters said they approved of O'Malley's actions and believed that they were a necessary evil. "Nobody likes taxes," said Commodore Monk, 60, of Prince George's County, who saw the budget crisis as a problem O'Malley inherited. "But if that's going to make the state more fiscally sound, and deal with some of the other pressing issues of the state like improving the school system and crime, we have to do what we have to do."

Asked to set aside their own personal feelings about the outcome and comment on the general fairness of the tax increases, 51 percent said they were unfair, compared with 33 percent who said the package was fair.

O'Malley crafted his proposal in a way that he said would hold harmless to most Maryland families and even save many of them money by shifting the tax burden to high-income workers. Much of the sense that the tax increases are unfair may be due to the increase in the sales tax from 5 percent to 6 percent because of its broad impact, Raabe said.

Marguerite Bowman, 60, a registered Democrat and retired teaching assistant who lives on Kent Island in Queen Anne's County, said she buys appliances and furniture in Delaware to save on sales tax and has even considered moving there to avoid high income taxes.

"I have thought about it several times," she said. "If I'm buying an appliance, I got news for you, I'm going to Delaware. If I'm buying furniture, I'm going to Delaware. People do it all the time out here, and we do it because we don't have to pay the sales tax."