Gov. Mark Sanford, who has probably never met a tax he didn't want to kill, has added a needed voice of reason to the General Assembly's war against the property tax.

Sanford has correctly stated that one can't lop off a tax without addressing what it's used for. And in South Carolina, the property tax is largely used for public schools. Sanford was right to interrupt the legislative chest-thumping long enough to remind the public that this situation still needs reason more than rhetoric.

"I think, unfortunately, the caboose is leading the train on this one," Sanford said. "You've got to look at what's the driver of this train. The reason property taxes are there is because of education."

And it also is there to provide the many services that people paying county and municipal taxes expect from their local governments.

As Hilton Head Island Mayor Tom Peeples put it in a letter published on the opposite page, "We are the first responders in an emergency. We provide basic police and fire services, water and sewer services, garbage service, parks and recreational services, stormwater management and drainage, and planning and zoning. We respond when there is an abandoned vehicle or a barking dog."

Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell makes no bones about his desire to relieve the public of the property tax. He is spreading the word that local governments have run amok, and it is up to the legislature to take heroic action to save the common man. It's not that simple.

When both the state Senate and House of Representatives each form committees to reform the property tax -- which isn't even a state tax -- the public better sit up and pay attention. Tax reform would be nice, but reforms must take into account that the public needs services, that services cost money, that the money has to come from somewhere, and that meaningful tax reform must include the income, sales and property taxes.