House committee endorses newspaper tax

INDIANAPOLIS -- A House committee on Monday endorsed a bill that would impose a fee on some daily newspapers published or distributed in Indiana.\nThe bill would impose a $2 fee on each metric ton of paper used to publish a daily newspaper with a circulation of at least 12,500 in Indiana. It also would impose a 1-cent fee for each newspaper published outside Indiana but distributed inside the state.\nHalf of the money raised would fund clean-water programs, while 45 percent would reimburse counties for property taxes they cannot collect on state-owned land. The remaining 5 percent would fund 4-H scholarships.\nThe House Environmental Affairs Committee approved the bill on a 6-4 vote.\nSupporters included the Indiana Farm Bureau, the Association of Indiana Counties and Indiana Department of Natural Resources.\nThe bill's sponsor, Rep. Richard Mangus, argued that newspapers have a significant impact on the environment and for that reason should help pay to protect it.\nNewspapers clog landfills, and newspaper advertisements are among the most difficult items to recycle or incinerate, said Mangus, R-Lakeville.\nOpponents, though, argued that the newspaper industry should not be penalized more than any other industries.\nSteve Key, a lobbyist for the Hoosier State Press Association, called it a "flawed premise" to paint newspapers as bad for the environment. There has been a stronger push to recycle newspapers than any other item, and newspapers represent only 4 percent of the total waste in landfills, he said.\nMayer Maloney, publisher of The Herald-Times of Bloomington, estimated the bill would result in a $6,000 annual cost to the newspaper, which has a daily circulation of about 28,000.\n"It has nothing to do with recycling, it has nothing to do with the environment. It has everything to do with funding pet projects," Maloney said. "I think it's unfair and ludicrous."\nLast month, the bill failed to advance after a tied vote in committee. At that time, the bill would have imposed a 1-cent fee on any newspaper with a circulation of more than 12,500 that publishes at least five days a week. The HSPA estimated then that the bill would raise at least $3.2 million.\nIn its current form, the bill would raise far less. The Indianapolis Star, which has a circulation of more than 267,000, estimated the bill would cost the newspaper about $90,000 each year, down from nearly $1 million in the bill's original form.