Poll finds 66 percent favor privatizing liquor stores
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HARRISBURG -- A new poll shows that two-thirds of Pennsylvania voters would support privatizing the state-owned liquor stores as a way to erase or reduce a hefty deficit that's projected for the next state budget.
According to a Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday, 66 percent of the 1,584 people surveyed from Dec. 6 to 13 favor dismantling the state's long-held system for selling liquor and wine and turning the stores over to private enterprise in order to ease state financial woes.
Only 26 percent opposed the idea of selling the state's liquor stores to help balance the state budget, said Peter A. Brown, a Quinnipiac poll official. In Allegheny County the margin was even wider, with 69 percent supporting privatization and 22 percent opposed, and the rest undecided. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
The poll assumes that the state faces a major budget deficit for the fiscal year that begins July 1, but almost no one doubts that. A deficit is due to the ongoing economic slowdown, rising state costs for pensions and other things, and a loss of federal funds. Most estimates for fiscal 2011-12 put the red ink in the range of $3 billion to $5 billion.
In the poll, 60 percent of respondents called the state budget problems "very serious," with another 33 percent calling them "somewhat serious."
Most officials see only three options -- raising taxes, cutting spending or turning state assets over to private hands. Not surprisingly, poll respondents strongly disliked the idea of raising taxes, by a 65 to 32 percent margin.
Also, Gov.-elect Tom Corbett, who takes office Jan. 18, has said he's opposed to raising taxes or fees. So legislators have only two real options -- reducing or eliminating state programs (and laying off workers), or selling or leasing state-owned assets, such as the wine and spirits stores, the Pennsylvania Turnpike or state parks, to private operators.
Mr. Corbett supports the idea of privatizing the state Liquor Control Board, even though efforts by previous GOP governors -- Dick Thornburgh in the 1980s and Tom Ridge in the 1990s -- failed.
"Pennsylvania consumers have always favored privatization of the LCB, and this poll demonstrates that again," said Corbett spokesman Kevin Harley. "What's been lacking is the political will to sell the liquor stores. But now the atmosphere has changed, and we're facing the most dire economic times, much worse than under Govs. Thornburgh or Ridge.
First Published December 16, 2010 12:00 am
