You heard it from me first.

Back in early March, Westchester County Executive Andy Spano told me he was against the controversial state proposal to help close the MTA’s $1.2 billion budget gap by imposing a payroll tax on businesses, nonprofits, school districts and local governments. This is a costly tax that may help out the MTA, but it will certainly cause an economic effect in terms of property tax increases and layoffs.

In response to my off-handed question on March 9, Spano said, “The payroll tax, I think is ridiculous at this particular point.” I put the quote in my column the next day.

To Spano’s credit, he’s on the right side of this issue.

Interestingly, he’s made himself available for a 2 p.m. Q&A today so that he can reiterate his opposition to the payroll tax. The reason this is interesting is because I mentioned the payroll tax in today’s column in a negative context. In the same column, I also pounded Spano’s State of the County Address in which he said that there is no need to “rethink” government. We just need to “rethink our values.”

I used the damaging payroll tax as an example of how, contrary to Spano’s contention, we do indeed need to rethink government.

However, I was probably remiss in not mentioning Spano’s original opposition to the payroll tax, which is about to be voted on the state Legislature. In any event, I don’t know how much influence he can muster to convince anyone in Albany that the tax is a bad idea. And it does seem his official stance is coming a bit late in the game.

Spano’s press conference today appears to be a last-minute effort to cover his tracks on this.

Here’s the press release dejour.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                May 5, 2009

WESTCHESTER COUNTY EXECUTIVE CALLS FOR LEGISLATURE TO STOP PAYROLL TAX
Spano says that tax will cost county residents millions and hurt businesses, non-profits and hospitals

County Executive Andy Spano called for the state Legislature and the Governor to stop a payroll tax that he said would cost Westchester residents millions of dollars and hurt taxpayers, businesses, hospitals and non-profits who are already struggling to survive.
Spano will hold a press availability at 2 p.m. today on the 9th floor of the County Office Building at 148 Martine Ave., in White Plains to discuss his opposition.
Spano, who has vocally opposed the tax for months, released a copy of a memo he sent to members of the Westchester delegation yesterday which reiterates his opposition to the tax.
Spano said the tax would cost Westchester County government alone $1.6 million and the Westchester Medical Center about $1 million.  He noted that Westchester County last year paid $121 million to the MTA out of county tax dollars, sales tax, and mortgage fees and budgeted $119 million for 2009.
He added, that the proposal does not “share the pain.”
“How come Connecticut gets away with not having to contribute when thousands of their riders use MTA transportation? Why is there no toll on the East River bridges? Why do we constantly bail out agencies that are inefficiently run? Yes, there should be relief on MTA fares, but once again, it should not be on the backs of our taxpayers, residents, non-profits and businesses.’’