(California) State to consider mileage tax

[question everything]

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2004/08/12/news/californian/21_27_168_11_04.txt

Thursday, August 12, 2004

By: DAVE DOWNEY - Staff Writer
North (San Diego) County Times

Picture this: You're cruising down the freeway and the fuel tank is on "E," so you pull off at the next exit to fill up. When you go to pay at the gas station counter, your bill includes tax based on the number of miles you drove since your last fillup. The mileage is automatically calculated by a transponder in your car that transmits the total to a machine inside the station.

Sound far-fetched? It might not be.

A state commission studying ways to thin Sacramento's bulky bureaucracy suggested last week that California move toward replacing the gasoline tax with a mileage tax, as a way to boost sagging transportation revenues at a time when rapid population growth is straining the state highway system. The commission recommended following the lead of a task force in Oregon that wants to test the concept of a mileage tax in one of its cities, Eugene, in 2005.

(snip)


However, the trail Oregon is blazing on the issue is troubling to many in California.

Whitty said the Oregon task force recommended a flat tax for everyone, rather than one that rewards fuel economy and the varying gasoline taxes motorists pay now. The panel proposed charging a fee that would generate the same amount of money as the existing 24-cent-a-gallon tax, he said. Based on average gas mileage of 20 miles per gallon. motorists would pay 1.2 cents per mile. Whitty said the panel chose to set a flat rate because the tax, philosophically, is based on the notion that most vehicles, no matter how efficient, tend to occupy about the same space on the road. And he said panel members prefer to reward fuel economy other ways.

But Ron Roberts, a Temecula councilman and president of the Southern California Association of Governments Regional Council, said a flat rate would penalize commuters who drive dozens of miles from their homes in Riverside County to jobs in San Diego, Orange and Los Angeles counties. "They're already paying more gas taxes than anybody else, and to make them suffer more by paying this vehicle-miles-traveled tax instead is ludicrous," Roberts said.

(snip)

Contact staff writer Dave Downey at [phone], Ext. 2616, or [e-mail].

[Katherine2]

1. How typical

Once again they want to get their revenues from the people with less money. Let's not tax the guy who can afford to live near his job, but let's tax the poor schmuck who lives in Riverside or Valencia because they can't afford to live near their jobs 50 miles away.

[gristy]

2. WTF?

he said panel members prefer to reward fuel economy other ways

Transponders? Taxing miles driven? When gas consumed is proportional to miles driven and we already have a gas tax? When people who drive gas guzzlers are proportionately taxed more? This whole idea is INSANE!!!!!!!!!

Follow the money. Someone stands to make wheelbarrows of money on this idea.

[dweller]

3. is there any other criteria?

other than $$ ?


dp

[benfranklin1776]

4. Good points, all.

There is also the fact that the state would then have a giant Big Brother database able to track a citizen's every driving movement. The next step would be to issue speeding tickets based on that information, to say nothing of the grievous potential for abuse of that database for all types of intrusive inquiries into your movements. E.G. "Excuse me sir we notice from your records an excessive number of trips to 'high crime areas' , we would like to search your house and vehicle for drugs." Never mind of course that you have very legitimate reasons to drive long distances through those so-called high crime areas like getting to your job. This is a civil liberties nightmare, and yes we need to follow the money trail and find out which corporate interest is pushing this scheme.

[dwckabal]

5. If we're going to tax based on miles

it should be based on MPG, not total mileage driven.

Morans.