Posted on 12/12/2008 7:49:36 AM PST by BGHater
State panel endorses idea of levy tied to yearly miles logged on a car's odometer.
A special transportation committee gave final approval Wednesday to a report that proposes a new tax on the number of miles a car is driven each year, as well as other options for generating highway and transit money.
The vehicle miles tax would be calculated during the car's annual inspection and likely would supplement or replace the gas tax.
Legislators on the 21st Century Transportation Committee cautioned that a new tax is unlikely to advance during a budget crisis.
The special committee was formed to propose a menu of options for transportation funding, because the state's primary sources of money – the gas tax and a tax on car sales – are flat or declining.
The group also proposed toll booths on I-77 and I-95.
Committee member Chuck McGrady, however, said the committee skirted the question of overhauling how the Department of Transportation operates after years of complaints about turf battles, political patronage and dysfunctional divisions.
“We haven't gone far enough,” said McGrady, a Henderson County commissioner.
Asheville Mayor Terry Bellamy, another committee member, cast the lone no vote on the final version of the recommendations, saying the vehicle miles tax unfairly penalized rural residents with long commutes and no public transportation.
Committee chairman Brad Wilson, chief operating officer of Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina, said the report could gather dust on a shelf unless individuals and communities support the recommendations. He acknowledged that raising new taxes is unpopular but said that a failing transportation system will make the state less attractive to new employers.
Steve Jackson, an analyst who focuses on transportation issues for the North Carolina Justice Center's Budget & Tax Center, criticized the report as lacking vision.
“The report offers no consistent vision for how to move forward,” he said in a news release. “… The policy solutions suggested are more 1955 than 2055.”
lots of unintended consquences here,
but leftists NEVER consider that people will change behaviors based on incentives.
The one I thought of, if they replace the gas tax with a mileage tax, there will be less reason to drive a fuel efficient car.
This is the tax collector your talking about. The onus is on you to prove those things.
There is already a mileage tax...it’s called the gas tax.
Not surprising from a state that in the 1960’s had a tax on the average balance of your checking account and a legislature that argued over tobacco taxes for the entire session without doing any other work.
What in the world is going on in NC, lately..Geeze my former home state has gone absolutely insane since I lived there in the 90’s??!
Should I refer to NC as the “Massachussetts of the South”?
No problem. Electric meters on the cars and automatic reader setup at the authorized DMV smog registration points. Registration renewal will require car to pass through like smog inspections now. Problem solved.
WTFIIWNC?
60's? The Supreme Court finally threw out this travesty (called the intangibles tax) in 1996. It not only hit your checking account but any stocks or bonds you owned.
North Carolina has the highest income tax in the region, above national average gasoline tax and puts a sales tax on virtually anything that is billed.
I got a bill from my leasing company for property taxes owed on my cars. There was a sales tax added based on the amount of the property tax. Needless to say, the Old North State has been ruled by Democrats for years.
I do. And I don't live there :)
Between the illegals and the carpetbaggers, NC went to hell several years ago.
maybe they should, oh i don’t know, REDUCE SPENDING!
The NC legislature raids the Highway fund for hundreds of millions of $$. Then moan ‘no money for roads’.
It would take a very sophisticated GPS based tracking system to separate legitimate use of state/federal roads from off road and out of state use. Even the best GPS based nav systems with DVD databases would be challenged to sort out the details. Perhaps a raw dump of bread crumb tracks could be digested externally. That is a major breach of privacy.
Contact your legislators and object strenuously. Don't let the camel get its nose under the tent.
I'll bet the mattress was king as a banking tool with that kind of stupid policy.
New cottage industry: odometer adjusting.
It’s not just about more taxes...it’s about tracking and eventually regulating and limiting your freedom of movement.
As it is, it's a Big Brother taxation nightmare.
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