We want it all!: To improve our schools, repair our streets and sewers, beef up our police, add prisons, overcome municipal budget deficits, erase our public employee "legacy" costs for pensions and health care -- and so on.

But no more taxes, please. Indeed, cut property taxes. Or, better yet, eliminate them.

Sorry, folks, we can't have it all. Politicians who promise everything are just fooling themselves and us.

Nevertheless, some remedies can be fashioned. The key, like it or not, is to change the Pennsylvania Constitution to make possible a graduated income tax, similar to the federal income tax. To make this happen -- to place the proposal on the ballot for a statewide referendum -- would require action by two successive sessions of the Legislature.

The roadblock is Article VIII, the "uniformity clause," which mandates: "All taxes shall be uniform, upon the same class of subjects, within the territorial limits of the authority levying the tax, and shall be levied and collected under the general laws." The article has 16 paragraphs of exceptions, but none for a graduated income tax.

Back in 1971 Gov. Milton Shapp's plan for a graduated income tax was thwarted by the State Supreme Court on grounds it violated the uniformity clause. We've been stuck ever since with a flat rate, which greatly favors those with high incomes.

To realize the possibilities, let's look at two sets of bills currently cooking in the Legislature. They were introduced by state Sen. Sean Logan and Rep. David Levdansky, both Allegheny County Democrats.

Mr. Logan, with Senate Bill 717, and Mr. Levdansky, with House Bill 1947, both want to amend the constitution to change Article VIII so that it's easier to exclude homesteads from property taxes.

But for my purposes, Mr. Logan's proposal is the most interesting because he goes to the heart of the matter in proposing a graduated income tax that would produce $5.2 billion a year. Taxpayers making less than $100,000 a year still would pay at the state's current 3.07 per cent income tax rate, with the rate rising step by step to 7.07 per cent for those making more than $400,000. This, he says, would bring Pennsylvania in line with its neighboring states.

Mr. Logan's SB 718 would gather more revenue by raising the sales tax by 1 percentage point ($1.5 billion) and from anticipated casino revenues ($1 billion) to reach a total of $7.7 billion -- enough to eliminate all property taxes levied by municipalities, counties and school districts. Property taxes on industrial and commercial properties would continue.

Mr. Levdansky does not propose a graduated income tax but would decrease the burden of school property taxes by increasing the personal income tax, or the sales tax, or both ($2 billion). He also would add the casino revenue ($1 billion).

This brings me to Step 2 of a possible plan after cracking open Article VIII:

Use about $3 billion of the new revenue from Mr. Logan's graduated income tax to increase the state share of local school expenses to 50 percent, its traditional level. In recent decades, the state share has slipped to 36 percent -- thrusting an ever greater burden onto local taxpayers. In most places, schools require the highest share of property taxes.

The advantage to this approach is that it would take a lot of pressure off local taxpayers while maintaining the property tax for local governments and schools. Despite the naysayers, the property tax is valuable in providing a stable source of revenue year in and year out for local government. Moreover, it is vital in balancing the tax burden, especially in contrast to increasing the sales tax, which throws an unequal load on the less well-off.

I should report that former state Rep. Ron Cowell, head of the Education Policy and Leadership Center in Harrisburg, is worried that just pouring more money into school districts under the present subsidy distribution formulas wouldn't "level the playing field." He and other school policy officials would like to see formulas that distribute more money to needy districts or to districts with a disproportionate number of children from needy families -- an "equity" approach -- rather than rewarding wealthy districts on a false per-pupil "equality" basis.

Finally, some of the income from a graduated income tax could be used to offset the reduction of some business taxes, such as the corporate net income levy, considered by many to be a particular Pennsylvania deterrent to attracting and holding business.

In sum, those hoping for a more just Pennsylvania tax system should bend their efforts toward amending Article VIII to allow a graduated income tax. Shake your heads as you may, but this is the only long-term answer to many of Pennsylvania's problems at all levels of government.