Oregon Legislature pivots to 3-cent gas tax increase instead of $11.7 billion transportation package

Yahoo

3 hours ago

Oregon Department of Transportation workers fill a pothole on U.S. Highway 97 near Chemult in 2016 (Oregon Department of Transportation/Flickr)
This is a developing story and will be updated
Oregon Democrats appear to have pulled the plug on a transportation package more than a year in the making, unable to find the votes for a series of tax increases as the legislative session draws to an end.
Instead, House Speaker Julie Fahey, D-Eugene, is pushing a 3-cent increase to the state's 40-cent gas tax and increases to vehicle and title fees. An estimate for how much it would raise hasn't yet been released, but it's sure to be a far cry from the $11.7 billion lawmakers aimed to raise over 10 years in their earlier bill.
Gov Tina Kotek plans to testify in favor of the new plan, her staff confirmed.
It's a blow to a legislative effort months in the making. Lawmakers traveled the state last summer, seeking public input on plans to overhaul the state's transportation funding system.
Fahey's 20-page amendment, attached to House Bill 3402, was scheduled for a hearing in the House Rules Committee at 3:45 p.m. and is expected to be sent to the Joint Transportation Reinvestment Committee from there. It would change a previously innocuous bill requiring the Department of Transportation to study speed bumps into a last-ditch attempt to raise some money for Oregon's crumbling roads and bridges
The new bill includes accountability measures, such as requiring regular audits of the transportation department and shifting responsibility to hire and fire the department's director from the Oregon Transportation Commission to the governor.
It would raise the gas tax from 40 cents to 43 cents, hike vehicle registration fees from $43 to $64 and increase vehicle title fees from $77 to $168.
Gone are increases to the transit payroll tax, which would have gradually tripled from 0.1% to 0.3% under prior versions of the measure. A proposal to mandate electric vehicle users pay a per-mile fee also didn't make the final bill.
Without the payroll tax increase, officials at Portland's public transit agency TriMet said they'd have to cut 27% of their bus service, eliminating 45 of 79 bus lines. The tax increase would have cost an Oregonian making the state's median annual income about $10 per month, according to TriMet's analysis.
The measure aims to fill an immediate funding gap of $1 billion per year that the Oregon Department of Transportation faces.
All tax increases in that bill are intended for the state transportation department, worrying cities and counties. In a statement Friday, Portland Mayor Keith Wilson said the bill would put Portland's street system at risk.
'It jeopardizes dozens of essential city infrastructure jobs and our ability to perform basic safety functions like filling potholes and implementing traffic safety improvements,' Wilson said. 'We can't afford a patchwork solution. Legislators, please don't leave Salem without addressing crumbling city transportation systems.'
The long-awaited transportation package faced headwinds in recent days, as Republicans and moderate Democrats lined up against it. Rep. Kevin Mannix, R-Salem, was the only Republican to publicly support the larger measure, saying it wasn't perfect but was better than nothing, while Sen. Mark Meek, D-Gladstone, doubled down on his objection to it.
'From the correspondence I've received from around the state of Oregon and my community both in letters, emails, phone calls, social media posts, I'm doing the right thing for Oregonians,' he said on the Senate floor Friday morning.
Reporters Alex Baumhardt and Shaanth Nanguneri contributed to this article.