VIDALIA — State smokers could be looking at a new tobacco tax, District 21 Rep. Andy Anders said.

While a proposed tobacco tax increase of $1 was defeated already in the legislative session, Anders said he believes a proposed $.50 increase will go before the House soon and eventually pass the legislature.

Many legislators have spoken of no new taxes, but the aim of most people who want to increase the tobacco tax is improved healthcare, Anders said.

“If you solve some of those healthcare problems it might clear up some of those other costs (the state has to pay), so it’s kind of a call you have to make with what your conscience feels like,” he said.

Listening to the Democratic and Republican sides of the debate leaves one wondering where funding is going to come from, Anders said.

“When you repeal the Stelly tax and with the price of oil where it is, where is the money going to come from?” he said. “I was not for the dollar tax for tobacco increase. When you get done taxing tobacco to death, what are you going to tax next, ground beef?”

Another issue Anders said will get a lot of attention in the coming weeks is the proposal for the state to give the New Orleans Saints funds to renovate the Superdome, among other things.

Because he got several House members from the southern half of the state to vote for the deal to keep the Pilgrim’s Pride chicken complex in Farmerville afloat, Anders said he would vote for the New Orleans deal.

District 32 Sen. Neil Riser said he could be described as “reluctant” about the Saints deal.

“That is something I am reluctant on, but it is an economic stimulus for them,” Riser said.

But Anders said that while he will vote for the Saints deal, he is going to want the kind of accountability the Pilgrim’s Pride deal had attached to it.

The Pilgrim’s Pride deal included requirements that a certain-sized workforce be kept and a certain amount of matching funds be provided by the company.

“You are not just giving these guys so many million dollars — there are strings attached saying you are going to work 1,200 people for so many years,” Anders said.

“For every dollar, the unemployment tax would have been greater than what we have done here.”

Riser said he is also watching Senate Bill 139, which has passed the senate and been sent to the House, which will eliminate any taxes on lunches served at schools.

Three percent of the 4 percent tax had been suspended for several years, but was set to go back into effect in June 2009.

The 1 percent that was in effect had been suspended at one point, but in recent years had gone back into effect.

“The state department of revenue had failed to collect those taxes, and they had said they wanted to retroactively collect those taxes,” Riser said. “Do you go to each individual student and ask them to ante up the tax, or do you go to the school?”

The only way for the schools to pay the taxes owed would have been for the state to allocate money to them from the general fund, so Riser’s bill would also retroactively suspend the 1 percent of the tax that has been active, he said.

The senator said he is waiting for the House to finish the budget, and he is working with the local House delegation.

“As far as getting funding for the district, I am going to try to make sure that anything (the local house delegation) puts in there stays in there, and if there is anything that needs to go in I will put it in on the Senate side,” Riser said.