No new taxes. No changes to the old taxes. No tax talk, period.

Gov. Janet Napolitano will not push for tax reform in the 2004 legislative session. The reason, she said, is that her handpicked task force has not delivered its ideas to modernize and streamline the tax code.

That means that a yearlong effort by the Citizens Finance Review Commission, whose work was due in October but will now continue into January, may not be considered for at least another year.

For the time being, this means an egg ranch in Glendale can continue to buy its equipment tax-free, and personal trainers, dry cleaners, hairdressers and other service providers won't have to add sales taxes to their customers' bills. But manufacturers and other big employers won't get the property-tax relief they have been requesting.

Napolitano said in October that her 2004-05 budget plan would not include a tax increase to offset a revenue shortfall estimated at $300 million to $900 million. But this week, she said she will not champion any of the Citizens Finance Review Commission's recommendations during the coming legislative session because they are not yet final and lawmakers go back to work Jan. 12.

"I still haven't seen the list, so it's impossible to include anything in the 2004-05 budget because we started that process months ago," Napolitano said. "The commission is not finished with its work yet. I need time to consider the advice they are giving me."

Although the commission has not finished, its draft recommendations and research have been available for weeks. Those proposals included extending the sales tax to services like hair care and auto maintenance and to add other new taxes worth nearly $800 million. The commission has discussed shifting nearly $600 million in business property taxes to homeowners to improve Arizona's business climate. Any tax increase would take a two-thirds majority to pass the Legislature.

Tom Liddy, chairman of the Maricopa County Republican Party, suggested that Napolitano, a Democrat, may have political reasons to avoid the tax issue. She's not up for re-election in November 2004, but Arizona voters will reshuffle the deck at the Legislature and help elect a new president.

"I think she planned all along to move these tax reforms, some of which net out as tax increases, in the next session," Liddy said. "But now I think she has turned her back on the commission's recommendations because she fears a grass-roots no-tax-increase upswell that could affect the outcome of the presidential election in a 10-electoral-college-vote swing state."

Napolitano campaigned on the need to revamp a tax code that is perforated with exemptions (critics call them "loopholes") that divert hundreds of millions of dollars from state coffers. She launched the citizens commission shortly after taking office in January, when the state faced a $1 billion budget deficit. Since then, she has deflected questions about the need for new revenues and other tax changes until the commission finishes its job.

Commission co-Chairman Bill Post said he never expected Napolitano to take the commission's ideas to the Legislature immediately.

"From Day 1, this has been a really long-term effort, not a short-term one," said Post, chief executive officer of Pinnacle West, parent company of Arizona Public Service. "The scope of our commission wasn't really to deal with this year's budget or the deficit issue."

But some of the tax experts and interest groups who helped the commission compile its extensive research were disappointed that there would be no immediate attempt to fix a tax code that most agree is unfair, inefficient and not friendly to businesses.

"It kind of makes you wonder what we were all studying for," said Kevin McCarthy, executive director of the Arizona Tax Research Association. "We've lost track of the hours we've spent researching for them. I'm a geek with this stuff, so I don't mind doing it. But it would have been nice if they had told us it wasn't going to amount to anything."

McCarthy said lawmakers just approved nearly $70 million for Child Protective Services and prisons "with no real way to pay for it."

Carol Kamin of the Children's Action Alliance said lawmakers can't afford to drag their feet on tax reform. Kamin said the public broadly supports funding for CPS, child-care subsidies for the poor and other social services. But, at current tax rates, state revenue is unlikely to grow enough to meet the growing demand for those services.

"Taxes are a tough political issue, everybody knows," Kamin said. "But on the ground, we have said we need these things. But where's the money going to come from?"

House Ways and Means Chairman Steve Huffman said Napolitano should not back off on tax reform, although he disagrees with much of what he has seen from her commission. Huffman said he will continue to push for tax changes recommended Tuesday by an ad hoc legislative-citizen committee of which he is co-chairman. That committee is pushing for lower business property taxes and an income-tax break for manufacturers.

"She promised the state tax reform, and it's absolutely irresponsible to back off now," said Huffman, R-Tucson. "That means she is either planning to come back in a special session, planning on putting something on the ballot to circumvent the Legislature, or planning on doing nothing."

A Napolitano spokesman said it is "premature" to guess what the governor will do with the recommendations until she sees them.