Utahns want the sales tax off food, many preferring a plan suggested by House Speaker Greg Curtis; they want business taxes cut for economic development; and they are split on "reforming" the state's income tax system, a new poll shows.

The Deseret Morning News and KSL-TV asked Utahns about half-a-dozen so-called "tax reform" proposals now being discussed by legislators and the Tax Reform Task Force, a group of 15 lawmakers and executive branch officials who have conducted an in-depth study of state and local taxes over the spring, summer and fall.

The task force's last meeting is scheduled for Nov. 28, when it will make major recommendations on income and sales taxes to January's 2006 Legislature.

Pollster Dan Jones & Associates found 38 percent of Utahns favor the plan of Curtis, R-Sandy, to remove the sales tax from food and raise the sales tax on nonfood items slightly so as not to lose $225 million in state and local government revenues that the food tax now brings in.

Twenty-six percent favor a plan by Senate President John Valentine, R-Orem, to remove the food sales tax and then cut state programs as needed to balance the 2006-07 budget.

Jones found 18 percent favor a plan to give low-income Utahns a $75-per-person income tax rebate in lieu of cutting the food sales tax.

Seventeen percent either mentioned some other way to cut the food tax or didn't have an opinion, Jones found.

Overall, it was clear from the poll that a huge majority of Utahns want the sales tax off food, the disagreement coming over the best way to do it, said Jones.

Utahns are mixed over whether to change the state income tax. Jones found 42 percent of Utahns don't want to mess with the current state income tax system at all — just cut the income tax rate as a way to return money to residents.

A third of Utahns favor a modified flat-rate income tax plan put forward by Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. — a flat rate 5 percent income tax for all Utahns with credits given for charitable giving and home mortgage interest.

Only 15 percent favor a 4 percent flat-rate income tax that gives some kind of deduction for charitable and mortgage interest.

The poll shows, then, that 48 percent of Utahns favor one or the other type of flat-rate tax, while 42 percent want to keep the current system and just get a rate cut.

Finally, a healthy majority — 57 percent — favor giving Utah businesses some kind of tax breaks next year to encourage economic and job growth, while 38 percent oppose such breaks.

The poll of 400 Utahns was conducted Nov. 10-12. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percent.

The task force is considering several different kinds of business tax breaks, including allowing Utah-based corporations to figure their income taxes in different ways which would, overall, be a $32.6 million tax cut.