INDIANAPOLIS | Lake County officials want the state to spare local taxpayers about $4 million a year by picking up a three-decade-old property tax charge that goes to subsidize region schools.

The supplemental schools levy, one of only two in the state, was created in 1973 to help growing suburban schools share in the property taxes paid by lakefront steel mills. Local officials consider the tax an anachronism, now that the state bears the primary responsibility for funding schools.

"We don't want the schools to lose this money, but we want it transferred over to the state, so the state has total control of all that cost," said Lake County Commissioner Gerry Scheub, D-Schererville. "We're not going to get the money because it's going to come off of property taxes. So it's a win-win for the taxpayer."

The supplemental schools tax raised $3.9 million this year at a rate of 1.62 cents per $100 of assessed value. Eliminating the charge would reduce the taxes on a $100,000 owner-occupied home by about $9 a year.

Last spring, the Indiana General Assembly approved a tax overhaul that, by raising the sales tax to 7 percent, shifted most of the responsibility for school funding to the state. But Lake County's supplemental tax wasn't included in the swap.

Scheub said county officials brought the issue to the legislature last session. And Lake County Commissioner Roosevelt Allen, D-Gary, was at the Statehouse lobbying for the tax pick up last month.

"It will be interesting to see if he can make the case," said state Rep. Mara Candelaria Reardon, D-Munster. "There's a lot of need out there."

Candelaria Reardon, who serves on the influential House Ways and Means Committee, stressed that the weakening economy will shape the legislative session that starts Jan. 7. State revenues came in flat the first quarter of this fiscal year, meaning legislators might have little or no new money to spend.

The Lake County supplemental schools tax was modeled after a similar charge created in 1965 for downstate Dearborn County, said Chuck Mayfield, an analyst with the Legislative Service Agency. The Dearborn County tax was established to share the wealth from the local Seagram's distillery, while the Lake County charge was linked to the steel mills.