Idaho - health advocates would like to push through a cigarette tax increase..

January 8, 2011 - State lawmakers are expected to consider a bill during the upcoming session that would significantly boost the price of cigarettes in Idaho.
Rep. Dennis Lake, the Republican who heads the House Revenue and Taxation Committee, said Thursday he has agreed to sponsor a measure supported by health groups to increase the cigarette tax by $1.25 per pack. Lake detailed the proposal at a legislative preview sponsored by the Associated Press.

Directly related news brief:
Idahoans - support raising state taxes on cigarettes and alcohol to address the state’s budget deficit..;
Idaho - health groups pushing for an increase in the tobacco tax...

Any proposals to hike taxes will face a tough fight in the 2011 session with the conservative turn of the Idaho Legislature during the November election. But Lake hopes his bill to increase Idaho’s 57-cent-per-pack cigarette tax will find favor because of the savings it could bring in health care-related costs. If Idaho boosted its tax by $1.25, the price of cigarettes would jump to about $7 a pack.

Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter's State of the State speech Monday, January 10th probably didn't give much hope to proponents of raising the state's tax on cigarettes and other tobacco products to curb smoking rates. Otter mentioned taxes 18 times in his address to the Idaho Legislature. Not once did he mention higher ones. (Otter speech dents advocates' cigarette tax hopes by JOHN MILLER - by The Associated Press, Bloomberg.com, 1/11/2011)

Nearly $320 million is spent every year in Idaho on health care costs related to tobacco use, and the cost to Idaho Medicaid, the health insurance program for the poor and disabled, is $83 million, said Heidi Low, the Idaho director of government relations for the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Action Network.

Reference: Idaho cigarette tax hike proposed Lawmaker sponsoring measure backed by health care groups, Jessie L. Bonner Associated Press, The Spokesman-Review, 1/7/2011; Legislation would increase cigarette tax by $1.25 a pack in Idaho by Jason Ford, Talk Radio 950 KOZE-AM Lewiston, Idaho, 1/6/2011.

Idaho - related news brief:
Idahoans - support raising state taxes on cigarettes and alcohol to address the state’s budget deficit..;
Idaho - health groups pushing for an increase in the tobacco tax..;
Idaho - state senator whose husband is a tobacco lobbyist snuffed out bill..;
Idaho - online cigarette marketer not immune from state laws..;
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