Dustin Franklin paid $495 and some change for the six books he needed second semester.

The senior biology major at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln has been buying pricey textbooks for four years.

Franklin knew he would need two particularly costly textbooks — one on genetics for $140 and a thick hardcover biochemistry textbook for $120.

In fact, his book bill was more than his monthly rent and utilities for the house he shares with three other students.

He thinks a proposal by Lincoln Sen. Danielle Nantkes to eliminate the state and local sales tax on college textbooks is a great idea.

“It would save me $30 to $50 (a semester). And that adds up when you buy books eight times during your college career,” he said

Nantkes introduced a bill (LB32) that would exempt college textbooks purchased by full- or part-time students from sales tax on Thursday, the first day of bill introduction.

She introduced the bill after being convinced by UNL student leaders that it would at least put a small dent in high education costs.

“The cost of education in general is a huge issue. And students can see the price of textbooks go up every year,” said David Solheim, chairman of the legislative liaison committee for UNL’s student government, and one of the students who took the issue to Nantkes.

Student government plans a Monday news conference where a mountain of ramen noodles, about four feet high, will be given to a lucky UNL student buying textbooks. The pile represents the amount of noodles a student could buy with the average $65 in sales tax that goes for books each year, Solheim said.

The lucky student will have a choice of taking the noodles — a college diet staple — or donating them to a food bank and taking the $65, he said.

Student leaders across the country are working to get their states to exempt textbooks from the sales tax, said Matt Schaefer, UNL student body president.

Student leaders estimate it will save the average student about $50 to $100 a year and might cost the state about $3 million in lost tax revenue, Schaefer said.

The bill was a new idea among a handful of tax-related bills, most of them retreads from previous years, introduced Thursday.

One returning idea, eliminating the estate tax, has a better chance of passage this year because Gov. Dave Heineman has made it one of his tax-cut priorities.

“I think it has a great chance this year,” said Blair Sen. Mick Mines, who introduced his own version (LB10).

His bill would end Nebraska’s estate tax, basically on estates of $1 million and higher, beginning this year.

The estate tax is one of the reasons Nebraska’s wealthy retirees are moving to other states, Mines said. Other states that have an estate tax are also looking at eliminating it.

“We don’t want to drive our generational wealth out of the state and the country,” he said.

Another old idea — creating a tax-free weekend in August where parents can shop for school clothes without paying a sales tax — is back.   Omaha Sen. Rich Pahls introduced a tax holiday bill (LB3), and Lincoln Sen. Bill Avery will offer a similar proposal next week.

A bill to create a weekend tax holiday has been before the Revenue Committee almost every year since Iowa created a similar tax-free weekend in 2000. Missouri also has established a tax-free shopping holiday in recent years.

But the proposals, which generally eliminate the sales tax on clothes, school supplies and personal computers for one weekend, have never made it out of committee to the full Legislature.

Veteran committee member Ron Raikes said the people the holiday intends to benefit — parents — are already getting a great tax benefit through free public schools. And the state’s share of that cost, state aid to education, comes in part through sales tax.

And if this weekend is a such a good draw for retailers, Raikes suggested that stores could simply cut their prices by 7.5 percent.

Another tax-related bill introduced by Sen. Carol Hudkins of Malcolm proposes raising the state’s gas tax by 3 cents a gallon to bring in  additional road building and road maintenance money. The additional $12 million would be divided among cities, counties and the state (LB41).  Hudkins has also offered a bill (LB42) that would earmark 49 cents of the state’s cigarette tax — about $63.7 million a year — now going to the state’s general fund, for road building and maintenance.

Reach Nancy Hicks at 473-7250 or nhicks@journalstar.com.