As a licensed professional land surveyor, I have an acute awareness of our infrastructure. Our roads and utilities are aging and no one wants to deal with it.
President Obama thinks infrastructure maintenance and construction jobs are the answer to our economy even though they are all temporary employment.Some of my engineering counterparts like the idea of big federal expenditures on our infrastructure and the lucrative contract to be gained. Indeed, I too could benefit from a Big Dig.
One of the ideas being promoted by my engineering colleagues is the Vehicle-Miles-Traveled Fee or mileage tax as I prefer to call it.
There is a notion in the engineering community that the current gas tax just isn't sufficient for keeping up with the wear and tear on our roads because of mileage efficient vehicles and that a usage-based tax is more appropriate.
How quickly we have forgotten one of the principle reasons for implementing the gas tax: to encourage use of public transportation systems.
Additionally, we have forgotten what we used to do before the gas tax. Not that long ago, we relied on the general fund to pay for roads.
It could be argued that the best way to prevent unnecessary military conflicts might be to end all of the various special taxes and fees so that Congress must fund domestic programs ahead of foreign military campaigns with obscure objectives.
A quick internet search of "gas tax" brings up numerous blogs, PR pieces, and reports about why we need a higher gas tax.
According to http://www.gaspricewatch.com/usgastaxes.asp California's gas tax is $0.18 per gallon. Other California gas taxes include a 6% state sales tax and 1.25% county, plus additional local sales taxes and 1.2 cents per gallon state under-ground storage tank (UST) fee.
The elephant in the room being ignored are the various allocations from General Funds to cover salaries and benefits. Locally, in Fullerton California, 80.2% of the General Fund is spent on Public Safety and 69.8% of the City's General Fund is spent paying the Public Safety salaries and benefits (City of Fullerton FY2011-2012 Adopted Budget).
The question shouldn't be which tax or fee to raise but rather where to cut spending.
So, as the gas tax is not quite keeping up with the needed infrastructure repairs, many are looking for the quick fix solution in rate hikes for everything from water, gas, roads, and even emergency services in some jurisdictions. I don't think raising the gas tax will change anything. Our same lack of fiscal discipline will soon find us looking to raise taxes elsewhere.
The elephant in the room being ignored are the various allocations from General Funds to cover salaries and benefits. Locally, in Fullerton California, 80.2% of the General Fund is spent on Public Safety and 69.8% of the City's General Fund is spent paying the Public Safety salaries and benefits (City of Fullerton FY2011-2012 Adopted Budget). The question shouldn't be which tax or fee to raise but rather where to cut spending.
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