“When was the last time you read some really good news?” is the catchy title of the 2001 annual report issued by Georgia-Pacific, the $25 billion pulp, paper, and what’n’all conglomerate with extensive ties to Virginia.

Some of the ties are direct -- a pulp and paper mill in Big Island, as I recall -- and some are indirect. For some time the company has held its timber land in a separate corporation, The Timber Company, but in 2000 sold all of it, including 91,000 acres here in Virginia, to an outfit called Plum Creek -- and then signed a multi-year agreement to purchase raw materials from Plum Creek. It is an arms-length, buy-back arrangement not uncommon in big business.

That’s fair enough. And Georgia-Pacific is doing okay, even in this tough economy. Says a Georgia-Pacific press release of July 18, 2002: Total sales for Georgia-Pacific in second quarter 2002 were $6.2 billion compared with $6.6 billion in second quarter 2001 ... The company’s earnings before income taxes, depreciation, amortization and unusual items from continuing operations were $644 million in second quarter 2002 compared with $774 million in second quarter 2001.

Timbering and related forest products manufacturing is big business. Real big here in Virginia. Says the Virginia Forest Products Association, in Sandston: The forest products industry in Virginia is a significant part of the economy of the Commonwealth. It produces over $11.5 billion worth of goods and services on an annual basis, making it one of the largest contributors to the gross state product.

You think an industry that robust could pay a little sales tax on purchases used in harvesting timber? It doesn’t. Not a penny.

You see, here in Virginia, home of tuition increases, public employee layoffs, decreased aid to local governments, home of delayed highway projects and increasing class sizes, home of diminishing support for those among us who suffer mental illness, and the ravages of substance abuse ... here in Virginia, home of reduced library hours and burgeoning public debt ... here in Virginia, purchases used in the harvesting of timber are exempt from the state sales tax most of us pay on the things we buy -- even on the food, and in some cases, the dog food, we eat.

And, please, don’t blame the timber industry. I don’t. It is what an industry should be -- simple and complicated, magnificent, self-perpetuating, and absolutely profitable. Exactly as it should be.

(By now, surely, Bush and Howe, the industry due here in Virginia, are in the bullpen, warming up! Stand down, guys. That’s not what this is about. Believe me, I know the counter arguments, the jobs, the investment, other taxes paid -- the da-de-da-de-da of all of it.)

The tax structure in this state is a complicated thing. It is also an injustice, a farce, and a study in special interests politics.

We, you and I, are the ‘special’ interests in that equation. The complication is in the politics. You see, where taxes are concerned, fairness can only be found in the eyes of the payers. And the payers elect the arbiters.

The total value of sales tax exemptions handed out in Virginia over the years exceeds $3.5 billion annually -- easily enough to address the ‘budget crisis’, with a billion or so to spare.

But do have a budget crisis? Or do we have a crisis in our thinking?

David Bailey, president of David Bailey and Associates, is a lobbyist for nonprofit agencies here in the Commonwealth. Calm, courteous, low-key, he is a straightforward man of integrity who would rank high on anybody’s decency index. His group, the Coalition of Virginia Nonprofits, earlier this year commissioned Richmond-based Fiscal Analytics, LLC to do an analysis of exemptions to the state’s sales tax.

Governor Warner would do well to have David Bailey over for lunch. He might find the beginnings of a thing still up for grabs, it seems to me -- something worthy of the word ‘legacy.’ (A half-cent regional tax increase doesn’t fit that bill. It doesn’t get over the bar. It doesn’t measure up.)

What could they discuss? They could begin with one of Fiscal Analytics key findings: The analysis suggests that in comparison with other states, in general Virginia has a very broad and loose exemption policy. This means that most entities, often in the for-profit category with uncertain or dubious public benefit, find it easier to obtain a sales tax exemption in Virginia than in other states, despite the fact that significant revenues are at stake. The state thus forgoes considerable additional revenues that other states with tighter exemption policies now enjoy.

Well why are the nonprofits bothered about all of this? Because they are pounded on when the issue comes up. Those licks are misplaced.

Virginia sales tax exemptions are grouped in ten categories in the Code of Virginia. There is a long, long list of them. The Department of Taxation, in a 1998 study, estimated the total revenue impact at $3,579,300,000 for the 1999 tax year.

Bailey’s nonprofits, the civic, cultural, and community service organizations that so often define and characterize our neighborhoods and our communities could claim only $11.7 million of that.

Let’s put that in perspective. When Motorolla rolled over, it cost the state eight times that, not counting half a billion in highway (Route 288) costs laid on for that ghost of broken promises. (And I know the da-de-da-de-da of that one. Too -- we needed the highway anyway, those other two big plants came -- all of it.)

Let’s put some more perspective on it. If one held harmless the nonprofits, the educational, and the agricultural exemptions currently in place, the state is still forgoing considerable sales tax revenue. How much? Three billion dollars.

Every legislator in Virginia knows the tax structure here is out of whack. The sales tax issue is just a small part of it. And every year, it seems, stutter starts are made on the road to tax reform. Some of the best -- and best intentioned -- minds in Virginia have worked hard at it, most recently Bob McDonnell and company, but the wicked mistress of re-election always beguiles them, distracts them, and brings them to a stop.

Gov. Warner lays out his case for the budget cuts on the 15th. It will be, at best, a band aid of slash and burn. He will miss an opportunity if he doesn’t turn his gaze to tax reform. The structure of our system is really what bedevils him. Fixing it would be worthy of a legacy.