A majority of Californians support a temporary sales tax increase to finance earthquake recovery efforts in the San Francisco area, according to a newspaper poll published Monday.
More than half the people polled also said the state should make existing freeways safer rather than construct new ones to ease traffic congestion, the Los Angeles Times poll found.And five out of nine people polled said transportation officials should scrap plans to double-deck freeways, while 61 percent replied the government has failed to adequately ensure freeway safety.
The poll was released a day before a special session of the Legislature, called for Tuesday by Gov. George Deukmejian. Lawmakers will grapple with ways to finance the recovery from the 7.1-magnitude temblor Oct. 17.
Of the 1,377 adults surveyed, 52 percent favored a temporarily higher sales tax to pay for repairs and to aid victims, while 41 percent opposed the idea and 7 percent were undecided, the poll found.
On average, people favoring the tax increase said they would pay about one cent more on the dollar for about two years, which would raise about $8.6 billion, according to the poll.
In addition to an increased sales tax, which now ranges from 6 percent to 7 percent in different parts of the state, the governor is considering an increase in the 18-cent-per-gallon gasoline tax.
The gas tax increase was opposed by 60 percent of the respondents.
On the question of highway safety, 57 percent of the respondents opted for making existing roads safer, while 32 percent called for building more highways and 11 percent said they were not sure, the poll found.
Even in traffic-plagued Los Angeles, earthquake-wary residents favored by a 2-to-1 majority placing a higher priority on freeway structural safety rather than on freeway expansion, according to the poll.
Half of those polled said they did not believe the collapse of the double-decked Interstate 880 in Oakland was due to faulty construction or engineering incompetence.
The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 3 percent.
The earthquake damage has promised to be extremely costly, with estimates ranging from $4 billion to $10 billion.The 1906 San Francisco earthquake cost $11 billion in today's dollars, experts said.
Last year's Midwest drought, by comparison, cost the gross national product $16.2 billion, according to a Commerce Department report.
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Quake hits Algeria
An earthquake struck northern Algeria, killing at least 30 people and injuring 300, authorities said Sunday.
The Tipasa region west of the capital shook with two tremors beginning about 8 p.m. Sunday night. The strongest registered 6 points in the Richter scales.
The tremors were felt 100 miles away in Algiers, where four people died of heart attacks. Authorities said rescue workers continued to search for survivors in the Tapasa region near the city of Cherchell near the coast.