Posted on 02/19/2004 6:33:05 AM PST by NormsRevenge
SACRAMENTO - In a rare move, the nonpartisan legislative analyst yesterday recommended raising the gasoline tax to improve a state road system hurt by four years of diverting transportation funds to tighten budget gaps.
Californians pay hundreds of dollars more than the average American for auto repairs and other costs due to rough roads, Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill said, adding that increased traffic congestion is harming the state's economy.
She pointed to a recent study that found bad roads cost the average San Diego motorist $667 a year, far above the national average of $396. Another study revealed that congestion costs San Diego motorists $524 a year in wasted fuel and time.
The influential analyst has often called for a mix of general spending cuts and tax increases to address budget shortfalls.
But rarely, if ever, has she called for a specific tax hike. Yesterday, as part of her analysis of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's budget plan, she recommended raising the gas tax of 18 cents per gallon by 6 cents.
"We are very concerned," Hill said, "that transportation project delay in California is harming the California economy."
She said congestion is estimated to cost California drivers more than $4.7 billion a year in time and fuel, which many economic experts say reduces business profits, hurts productivity and results in fewer jobs.
Hill's recommendation will not change Schwarzenegger's opposition to raising taxes, a spokesman said.
The governor is counting on proposed cuts, improved economic activity and borrowing to close the $22 billion budget gap.
"We had to make a lot of difficult decisions," said H.D. Palmer, a spokesman for the governor's Department of Finance.
Hill said that although the growth of traffic on state roads increased at an above-average rate since 2001, lawmakers used several billion dollars in transportation funds to help close state budget gaps.
As a result, Hill said, not only are maintenance and new projects delayed, but money also is wasted as highway and road projects are started, stopped and then started again.
She calculated that at least $2.2 billion in transportation funds has been diverted to the general fund.
The governor's budget plan would divert an additional $2 billion in transportation money.
Schwarzenegger, following the policy of his predecessor, then-Gov. Gray Davis, is proposing to suspend Proposition 42, which voters passed in 2002 to shift the sales tax on gasoline from the general fund to transportation needs.
Hill urged the Legislature to ask voters to repeal Proposition 42 and replace it with the 6-cent-a-gallon increase, yielding about the same amount of revenue, $1 billion a year.
She is recommending the change because the gasoline tax, unlike the sales tax, goes into a special fund that cannot be easily raided by lawmakers as they struggle to close budget gaps.
Hill said the gas tax should be indexed to increase according to traffic growth.
As one measure of the deterioration of California roads, Hill's analysis cited a study last year by The Road Information Program, or TRIP, a nonprofit organization funded by business and labor groups.
The study, using federal data, found that six of the 10 urban areas with the highest percentage of bad roads are in California. The study then estimated the repair, fuel and tire costs due to rough roads.
The national average was $396 a year.
The highest costs were in four California urban areas: Los Angeles, $706; San Jose, $705; San Francisco-Oakland, $674; and San Diego, $667.
In another measure, Hill's analysis cited annual statistics published by the Federal Highway Administration showing that California's interstate and state highways and major streets and roads are the second roughest in the nation.
In California, 26 percent of the roads were rated as unacceptably rough by drivers, trailing only Massachusetts, with 36 percent. The national average was 8 percent.
Officials with the San Diego Association of Governments were skeptical of the TRIP study, which found that San Diego has some of the roughest urban roads in the nation.
The TRIP survey said 60 percent of San Diego roads were in need of maintenance; however, past surveys by the state transportation agency, Caltrans, showed that only 2 percent to 4 percent were in need of repair, said Gary Gallegos, SANDAG's executive director.
"A lot of it has to do with the great weather conditions we have in San Diego," Gallegos said.
He said San Diego has little of two natural conditions that contribute to road deterioration: rain and the expansion and contraction caused by temperature change.
In addition, he said, many of San Diego's roadways are made of concrete, which tends to require less maintenance than some roads surfaced with asphalt.
Gallegos said SANDAG'S main concern is not maintenance, but a road and highway system that has not grown to handle increasing vehicle traffic.
"We have been seeing our infrastructure get taxed more from a congestion perspective," he said.
A study by the Texas Transportation Institute estimated that congestion cost the average San Diego motorist $524 a year in 2001, a ranking of 15th in the nation, said Erick Pahlke, another SANDAG official.
One of the transportation funding problems, Gallegos said, is that revenue from a gasoline tax fixed at 18 cents a gallon does not keep pace with traffic growth as vehicles become more fuel-efficient.
Hill pointed out that when the analyst's office recommended a gas tax increase in 1986, nearly five years went by before the gasoline tax was raised by an initiative in 1990.
. . . but how about recouping some of the money purloined from the other, less useful state agencies.
Stop diverting the funds. Start a charity to pay for what ever low life left wing group is sucking up the cash. Problem solved.
All left wing programs should be paid for by charity. If the nation thinks they're important, they'll give. Stealing from the innocent isn't the answer.
(kalli is gonna be the 1st state to tax its way to prosperity...diversity is our strength, special interest programs for everyone)
"MEXICANS???"
Exactly! If the roads are underfunded for repairs because the funds are diverted elsewhere, adding more money to the diverted funds will not help.
I thought part of the gas tax was a percentage of the estimated price. When gas price were high last year, someone complained that the estimation process was flawed and resulted in people paying more tax than they should (perhaps when the prices were declining?). This article makes it seem like a fixed price per gallon.
If OPEC production cuts don't sheer them naked, the CA beaucrats will.
Apparently Cali-sheeple are easily shorn, and the smart ones moved off to a tax friendly states. 
We luv taxes baahhhh...
Someone say move to Nevada, Wyoming, Florida, or Texas?
The Sheiks of Sacramento
Senator Tom McClintock
Date: March 16, 2000
The blame game is a favorite pastime in Sacramento, and the current global run-up in oil prices has the advantage that blame abounds everywhere. OPEC did what cartels do: manipulate the supply to reap huge windfalls. Oil companies did what companies do: keep pace with rising market prices. And government did what governments do: tax the higher prices and blame everybody else.
But there’s an important distinction. While OPEC is working on behalf of its members, and oil companies on behalf of their stockholders, government’s actions are directly contrary to the interests of their constituents. And government bears a great deal of the blame for the prices that we pay at the pump.
In 1995, for example, Congress passed legislation to open just one percent of federal land in Alaska -- all of it barren tundra -- for oil exploration. The U.S. Geological Survey estimates there’s an additional 16 billion barrels of oil there -- enough to match 30 years of Saudi Arabian production, all under American control. But President Clinton vetoed it, so five years later American oil stays in the ground while OPEC has its way with American consumers.
California government has added to the problem by making new oil exploration and production virtually impossible. Those politicians who have made their political careers by protecting OPEC from American competition shouldn’t be surprised when OPEC uses that power to jack up prices.
These are blunders that took years to make and will take years to correct. But there are a few immediate steps that state government could take to relieve Californians of astronomical gas prices right now.
Even in the best of times, Californians pay between ten cents and fifty cents more per gallon than their neighbors right across the state line. One reason is that draconian restrictions have turned California into an economic gulag where only a few refiners are allowed to supply the entire state.
An even more direct reason is that Californians pay the fourth highest taxes per gallon in the nation. One component of this burden is the state sales tax, first applied to gasoline in 1971, which now adds an extra 15-cents per gallon at today’s prices [in March 2000]. Indeed, the recent worldwide increase in gas prices means a half billion-dollar annual windfall profit for Sacramento -- a figure that would make any OPEC sheik envious.
California could reduce the price at the pump by 15-cents per gallon overnight by abolishing this tax. A measure to do so is pending in the California Assembly, but it failed on a straight party-line vote last week, with Republicans supporting it and Democrats opposing it.
Democrats argued that abolishing the gas sales tax would somehow take money from roads – but not a penny of this tax goes anywhere near our roads.
They argued that oil companies would pocket a sales tax cut -- but oil companies don’t pay the tax. Consumers pay it at the pump after the market has determined the price.
In a rare moment of candor, Democratic Assemblyman John Longville explained, "we need the money." That’s a hard argument to make with a straight face when the treasury is bulging with the most obscene budget surplus in the history of this or any other state.
Some Democratic legislators get it. This week, Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa announced his own plan that temporarily reduces the tax by 10-cents per gallon during the summer months. It immediately came under attack by more leftist elements in his caucus.
This shouldn’t be a partisan issue. It was Assembly Democrats in New York who proposed an identical measure that is about to be sent to Gov. Pataki. The Illinois State Senate unanimously approved a similar measure last week. Guyana just relieved its citizens of a 20-cent per gallon consumption tax.
Californians could see a 15-cent per gallon drop in gas prices within 24 hours if the political will existed in Sacramento. But legislators couldn’t take the time to do so while they raced to adopt resolutions declaring Sober Graduation Month, Agriculture Appreciation Week, and amendments to the 1999 Bunk Beds Safety Act.
SO now they want the Kalifornians to pay hundreds of dollars more each in taxes and they still won't fix the roads. Government in action. A gun to your head and a hand in your wallet, meanwhile sanctimoniously bleating about how taking your money is good for you.
If none of the gas tax goes to our roads, where would the 33% increase go?
Tom McClintock was right. The gas tax doesn't go toward its intended purpose, so why not repeal it to take money away from the Democrats and return it to the people? (Remember, gas in 2000 was cheaper than it is now)
Actually, Texas was on our "Get-the-Heck-Outta-Sodom" short list, but, for the houses we were looking at there the property taxes would be nearly as much as our P&I here!
You are correct, though, moving is always an option.
In 1990, voters approved Prop 111 (laughingly titled "The Traffic Congestion Relief and Spending Limitation Act of 1990"), which doubled the California excise tax on gasoline over 4 years:
Prior to 8/1/1990 = 9.0¢/gallon
8/1/1990 = +5.0¢/gallon
1/1/1991 = +1.0¢/gallon
1/1/1992 = +1.0¢/gallon
1/1/1993 = +1.0¢/gallon
1/1/1994 = +1.0¢/gallon
_______
18.0¢/gallon
And don't forget to add on the sales tax, which is also applied to the above excise taxes themselves(!).
The first question out of anyone's mouth when somebody says, "We need more money for [insert popular thing here]" should be, "What the hell happened to all the money we've already given you?" In this particular case, "Where the hell is all the Prop 111 money going?"
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