PROVIDENCE — Freeze the so-called “tax-cut-for-the- rich” in its tracks before state government loses tens of millions of dollars.

Halt the phaseout of the capital gains tax before the state loses millions more.

And then extend the state’s sales tax to “luxury items,” such as airplanes; boat moorings; fitness, golf and country-club memberships; medical and legal services and any single article of food or clothing that costs more than $150. And slap a new tax on land speculators who make big money buying and quickly reselling real estate at inflated prices.

Sound good?

On the day the House Finance Committee opened hearings on Governor Carcieri’s spending and cost-cutting plans, these were some of the alternatives trumpeted at a State House news conference by the advocacy group The Campaign for Rhode Island’s Priorities, whose members include the Rhode Island Alliance for Retired Americans, the R.I. Coalition for the Homeless, the R.I. Council of Community Mental Health Organizations, AIDS Care Ocean State and an armada of public employee unions.

They believe their “loophole-closing” tax-package could raise — or avert the loss to the state treasury of — more than $100 million that could be used to head off moves to knock several thousand of the state’s young, old and working poor off the state’s health-care, childcare and prescription-drug subsidy rolls. Many of their proposals already have legislative bill numbers attached to them.

“As any family knows, when you are faced with a difficult budget, you don’t cut costs by taking away the baby’s formula. … First you look for places to increase your income,” said Karen Malcolm, executive director of one of the member advocacy groups: Ocean State Action.

Among the other featured speakers was a Wheaton College professor of economics who stated unequivocally: there is no credible evidence that “tax giveaways to the rich” translate into more jobs, as the champions of last year’s tax cut for the state’s wealthiest taxpayers contended.

“I must admit there is a certain seductive logic to [the] notion that reducing taxes on the rich and large corporations will stimulate economic growth and create jobs. But it doesn’t hold up to scrutiny,” Prof. John Miller said.

Looking at some of the budget-cutting alternatives Carcieri has proposed, including layoffs, wage cuts for state workers, and reduced eligibility for state-subsidized health and childcare, Miller asked: “How will Rhode Island — when it cuts support for children, when it cuts health care for working Rhode Islanders, when it has less support for new immigrants and less support for teens — be a better place to invest in?”

But the notion of raising taxes to plug a projected $354-million revenue-spending gap this year and next drew a cool reception from key Democratic lawmakers interviewed after yesterday’s news conference — and outright opposition from Republican Carcieri.

House Majority Leader Gordon D. Fox was non-committal, saying: “I recognize the need for long-term planning regarding budgetary matters. However, I will refrain from commenting on the specific proposals that were raised today because they all have to be viewed in the context of the overall state budget.”

House Finance Chairman Steven M. Costantino said he would consider proposals for reining in the state’s expensive historic tax-credit program, but would not look favorably on any proposal to halt the long-promised capital gains tax phase-out or revoke the new opportunity lawmakers gave the state’s wealthiest taxpayers last year to reduce their income taxes by paying an alternative flat tax.

Estimates are the new flat-tax will benefit about 1,687 of the state’s 567,000 income taxpayers this year at a cost to the state treasury of about $7.2 million; 2,886 taxpayers next year at a cost — in lost tax revenues — of $15.45 million and 13,119 taxpayers, at an annual cost of $80.6 million after the new 5.5 percent flat-tax rate is fully phased-in in 2011.

The tax cut was not linked — as its predecessors had been — to the creation of a specific number of new jobs. But it was pitched to lawmakers — and enthusiastically embraced by House Democratic leaders — as a way to both keep and bring “major decision-makers” to Rhode Island who would produce jobs.

Given how concerned the legislature remains about jobs, Costantino, D-Providence, said he would be “afraid to touch that right now.”

Carcieri was even more adamantly opposed.

A statement issued late yesterday by his office said: “Fundamentally, Governor Carcieri believes we must cut spending so we can cut taxes. By contrast, this group’s only answer is to increase Rhode Island taxes so we can also continue to increase state spending. Unfortunately, the ‘Coalition to Raise Your Taxes’ continues to cling to the mistaken belief that we can tax and spend our way to good fiscal health.”

“Like every Rhode Island family,” spokesman Jeff Neal said, “state government must begin to live within its means. A family cannot increase its spending by 8 or 9 percent each year if their household income is only going up by 4 or 5 percent. Similarly, state government cannot continue to increase spending by 8 or 9 percent a year if our underlying revenues are only growing by 4 or 5 percent a year.”

With respect to halting the phased two-year repeal of the state’s capital gains tax, Miller noted that Massachusetts also started down the path and then stopped in May 2002 when the state hit its own revenue-crunch.

But Carcieri “believes that this is an important part of our effort to reduce the state’s overall tax burden, to attract businesses to the Ocean State, to grow jobs for Rhode Islanders, and to ultimately increase the resources available to fund important state programs,” Neal said. (Rhode Island’s capital gains tax rate is slated to drop to zero next year on the sale of assets held for more than five years. The cost to the state treasury: an estimated $25.4 million next year; $31.7 million the following year.)

Carcieri is also wedded to keeping the flat-tax alternative for the state’s highest wage-earners because he believes “this tax reform was only the beginning of the across-the-board tax reductions necessary to generate economic growth, jobs and additional state revenues for years to come.”

With respect to broadening the reach of the state’s 7 percent tax, Neal said the governor “would be willing to consider options for bringing Rhode Island’s sales tax into line” with Massachusetts (5 percent), so we are no longer at a competitive disadvantage.”

The advocates who led yesterday’s news conference also proposed lifting the newly lowered cap on how much the cities and towns can raise their own taxes each year. That too promised to be a hard sell.