Ehrlich, Kozitza face off in Marblehead debate

MARBLEHEAD – State Rep. Lori Ehrlich, D-Marblehead and Republican challenger Kate Kozitza of Swampscott disagreed on reducing the state sales tax and repealing an additional state charge on alcoholic beverages Monday evening in their only public debate.Ehrlich, a certified public accountant, first ran for office in 2008 and she is seeking her second full term. Kozitza is a psychiatrist in her first run for public office. The League of Women Voters sponsored the debate at the Marblehead Village School auditorium for an audience of 200, with Republicans and Democrats apparently sitting on different sides.Both women promised to be full-time state representatives. Both said they support Chapter 40B, casinos, charter schools – Ehrlich said she would change the way they are funded – infrastructure maintenance, anti-bullying programs and decreasing pollution from the Salem Power Plant.Ehrlich said sales tax reduction, a ballot question this year, would cost Swampscott $1.4 million, Marblehead $1.7 million and Lynn nearly $17 million in local aid, forcing the layoffs of public employees. “It would be devastating,” she said.Ehrlich said the additional charge on alcoholic beverages was an elimination of an exemption, not a tax. She said the cost to consumers was minimal and the money it raised was spent on programs for alcohol and prescription medication abuse.Kozitza said the legislature should have voted to roll back the sales tax in the first place and made the referendum question unnecessary. “The legislature has a hearing problem,” she said. “Let them know we?ve had enough.”Kozitza referred to the additional liquor charge as a sales tax, a damper on the economy and “a tax on top of a tax, double dipping. It hurts the economy badly. People are buying liquor out of state.”Kozitza hammered at what she called Ehrlich?s vote on the liquor charge as a vote to increase the sales tax in her answers to questions about job creation, infrastructure and district problems.Ehrlich lost no time reminding her audience that she worked to get the town state aid for the renovation of the Marblehead Village School and pointed out that she is the only CPA in the legislature. “Experience matters,” she said.For complete election coverage, visit www.itemlive.com/elections