fuel tax increase badly needed

By on March 2, 2013 in

Since my letter to the editors did not pass UL muster I’m printing it here:

I suggest to Sen. Chuck Morse and other lawmakers that we must raise the gas tax because to do otherwise will hurt business in the state. When I see delivery trucks struggling to travel on many of our secondary highways, especially at this time of year, I’m sure there must be considerable lost time and vehicle damage. When I know my neighbors have no choice but to travel roads that are all busted up because of frost heaves, I know that there is much greater wear and tear on their vehicles.

I understand that Senator Morse lives in the Salem area. The roads there might be in better that average condition, but up here in the Lakes Region and further North, small business owners, are suffering from lack of road maintenance on state secondary highways. The worst is that, in many cases, because of a shortage of funds, there is NO plan to improve these roads for the next ten, possibly twenty years!  Pretty soon some will be down to dirt!

Businesses need good roads in order to be successful. Where is the support for much needed repairs of roads and bridges? What are our elected officials waiting for? Frost heaves, drainage problems, substandard bridges, and poor surfaces do not go away on their own- they only get worse!

Take a trip up North, Senator Morse and see what we have to travel on. Bring your friends too. Remember to drive something with good springs – you’ll need them!

Fran Taylor

for visuals go to Picasa Web Albums  view online, then search “NH broken highways” when folder title comes up double click on title to view slide show

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  • Rep. Jim Splaine

    It doesn’t look good for passage, but Rep. Dave Campbell of Nashua is a hero to me in leading this cause. It’s good for our employers, good for employees, good for the safety of our residents and visitors, it’s good for our tourism industry, it’s good for business, and in both the short and long-term it’s good for the pockets of our citizens.

    Unfortunately, too many of the right-wingers and Tea Partiers who don’t care about government and “community” want to see government fail. They’re cheerleading the sequester because most of them won’t feel it as much as those who serve in our government, or need help right now from our government.

    But, we will overcome.

  • susanthe

    Thanks Frant. At least you tried. There ought to be a mandatory tour of the north country for all of the clowns who never venture north of Concord. They should be forced to drive up to West Stewartstown in an old school bus, and fed lots of coffee.

    Sadly for them, all of the rest areas have been closed.

    • MartyInNashua

      We have a bill that might get some of those rest areas reopened with a public-private partnership. Minority Leader Chandler is working on an amendment and if the timing doesn’t work out on that, we’ll retain the bill and get it done next year.

      • susanthe

        Thank you Marty. It is sad that in a state where tourism is the #2 industry we can’t manage to fund a few rest areas.

      • hannah

        Public/private partnerships only work when there’s a public purse to be tapped for a guaranteed income stream — like the picture IDs that everyone is going to have to renew whenever they move.
        Citizens need to be educated to the fact that money is a lot like aluminum cans — it needs to be recycled to do any good. Indeed, since Washington prints the stuff, they could just keep issuing more, but that’s inefficient. Money needs to be recycled and people have to be dissuaded from hoarding. That’s what taxes are for, to keep the dollars moving.
        Unfortunately, now that dollars can be stored as electronic bits, there is no limit to how much one person can accumulate.

      • BobRobertson

        Is there a reason why those rest areas are closed at all? If they’re needed, wanted, then just open them and let whomever can make a profit running them do so.

        Hold an auction, and sell them off. Wouldn’t cost the state a penny.

  • pberch

    I plan to vote for the road ( gas ) tax for the obvious reasons. Far more difficult is the question about casino gambling. As long we income/sales tax is off the table – and it is – how do we meet the needs of our mental health system, children in need of services, community colleges and the university system, etc? Do we simply say to these folks – you gotta wait until an income tax is created? Keeping in mind, that selling alcohol is our 4th largest revenue producer and the so-called social ills from gambling are miniscule compared to that caused by alcohol. One of my main questions is how much $$ we will actually get from casino gambling – is it real money or purely hypothetical money. I am not convinced will will actually net much money.

  • mevansnh

    Patch has been taking a survey on this very subject today, and most people who have commented are opposed to any increase, but they can’t tell us how or who should pay for maintaining the state’s investment in infrastructure.

    I don’t want to pay any more in gas taxes than the next guy, but I realize that if NH is to maintain its supposed advantage, it must maintain its roads and bridges or people will go elsewhere, and the people who have the greatest responsibility to pay for the roads and bridges are those of us who use them on a daily basis.

    NH has never been known to be a responsible state when it comes to the public good or commons. We either want someone else to pay, or to get by without and I, for one, think this behavior and philosophy has come home to bite us.

    • MartyInNashua

      It needs to be noted that the retail price of gasoline is very insensitive to the taxation level. It should not be assumed that the increase will pass through penny for penny. Fuel prices are set in an area depending on local competition. We have two gas station owners sitting on the Public Works committee who testified to this as well as others in the public hearing. The hearing on HB617 had enough attendees to be moved to Reps Hall and of the several dozen people who testified, only four were in opposition.

      A study by TRIP, which is a transportation policy research organization, found that the average annual repair cost for a driver due to bad roads is $323 and the amount raised in the fourth year after the road toll is fully phased in would be $80.

      Another very important fact is that deferred maintenance is very expensive. Paving a road on an eight year schedule costs about $50,000 per mile and can keep it in good condition indefinitely. Reconstructing it after neglect such as we have been doing can cost as much as one million per mile.

      • mevansnh

        I copied your last two paragraphs and posted them on the Nashua Patch discussion of the proposed gas tax for the edification of the know-it-all-whiners over there. FYI. Hopefully, there might be one or two who will understand. The rest appear to be teaparty types who only care about their pocketbooks today.

      • mevansnh

        One of the things those at Patch are complaining about is the idea that these revenue increases through a the gas tax aren’t not being designated specially for DOT and road/bridge repairs, but could be used in the general fund to support “free-loaders” as they call the disadvantaged. Is that true? or is that a misconception?

        • MartyInNashua

          The parliamentary situation is that HB617 passed the Public Works committee on an 18-0 vote, and there is a floor vote at the next House session on Wednesday. If that passes, HB617 will be referred to the Ways and Means committee, since it is a revenue bill. It would then get a second set of hearings, committee recommendation, and floor vote.

          There is a superseding amendment to HB617 (“replacing all after the enacting clause with”) printed in Calendar No. 20, to which I would refer anyone who wants the details.

          The short answer is no, the funding goes to what it says after “used exclusively for”.

          260:32-a Account Established. There is hereby established a separate account in the highway fund called the New Hampshire state and municipal road and bridge account. The account is to be used exclusively for the construction, reconstruction, and maintenance of state and municipal roads and bridges, including weight-restricted bridges and unnumbered roads owned by the state, to improve safe travel for motorists, create jobs, and promote commerce, tourism, and economic growth in the state. The account shall consist of the funds attributable to all road toll revenue collected in excess of $.18 per gallon, net of any block grant aid apportionment pursuant to RSA 235:23, I.

          • MartyInNashua

            The “block grant” mentioned is a percentage that is roped off and sent to the cities and towns for use on municipally owned roads and bridges.

            There are several funds in play here. The General Fund is where most taxes go, and is appropriated to run most of the government.

            The Turnpike Fund is where tolls raised on the three turnpikes go, and is used exclusively to operate, maintain, and improve the turnpikes. No money from tolls goes to any other highway.

            The Highway Fund is where the road toll, vehicle registration, driver licensing, and traffic fines goes. By Constitution Part II Article 6-A, it is used only to operate, maintain, and improve the highway system. A lot of this money goes to winter maintenance, and some goes to the Department of Safety to fund state troopers and a little goes to the courts to fund traffic enforcement. These amounts are capped by statute.

            If you wanted to see the details, you could look at the Governor’s Budget documents.

          • MartyInNashua

            The diversion from road use that the member from Mont Vernon put all over the press is due to RSA 260:61. The road toll is determined and remitted at the wholesale level. If fuel is ultimately used in boats or off-highway recreational vehicles, it should have been non-taxable. There is a way for people to apply for refunds for these uses. If they do not, whatever remains in that status is transferred to the Fish and Game department and to the Resources and Economic Development department. This has been painted as a deliberate attempt to be deceitful about the “every penny is spent on road maintenance” claim.

  • susanthe

    NH provides a minimal (at best) support for “freeloaders.”

    The problem is that decades of GOP legislatures kicked the infrastructure can down the road. For a long time, we got by on the “Not a revenue problem” slogan, the tax free live free or die state baloney we’re all familiar with.

    They were so proud of the fact that we have the huge volunteer legislature (part of the problem, in my opinion) and we spend so little.

    Except that we’ve spent so little that we’re not competitive any more. States that do have *gasp* income tax and sales tax (Vermont and Massachusetts) are creating jobs. We’re stuck in stagnation. NH has never, ever spent more than a minute thinking about the future. We’re always treading water trying to maintain the status quo. And the propaganda has been in effect for so long “Ax the tax!” that there really isn’t any hope of change. Not with that giant volunteer legislature. We should be embarrassed that the 10 year transportation plan will take over 20 years, and in those 20 years it will be completely inadequate. We should be embarrassed that our bridges and dams are a ticking time bomb. It’s only a matter of time before there’s some kind of disaster. And maybe then we’ll get around to thinking that spending some money on infrastructure might be a good idea. And maybe not. Maybe we’ll keep dealing with each new situation, as if it were some sort of surprise.

    There is no vision here. If there were, we’d be raising enough revenue to take care of our infrastructure needs (roads, bridges, dams, water and wastewater treatment systems) AND our state parks, which are desperately in need of intervention. Tourism is our #2 industry, yet we expect tourists to keep coming here and spending their dollars, while we give nothing back.

    The US Chamber of Commerce issued a report that found that the states that have the best recovering economies are the states investing in infrastructure and eduction – the opposite of what NH is doing. Instead, we’re coddling tinfoil hat wearing lunatics and gun nuts. We’re stuck with a faction that are intent on brainwashing the populace into believing that right to work is the answer for what ails us. WE are what ails us, and until we recognize that, nothing is going to change here.

    • mevansnh

      I couldn’t agree more. For years I’ve believed that the only fair way to pay for the common good is through revenue collection based on one’s ability to pay…not what he buys or owns for a home. I realize that is an abominable thought for red necks in NH who have always tried to get by with the least and have someone other that the citizens who benefit pay.

      • BobRobertson

        If I may, the strongest objection I’ve seen to an income tax is that there is nothing to stop what has happened everywhere else: Both property tax AND income tax.