As we reported earlier this week, Gov. Chris Gregoire just rolled out a ten-year, $3.6 billion transportation package, including a new barrel fee on oil and a $100 annual fee on electric cars, that would pay for road operations and maintenance, ferries, and grants to local jurisdictions.
However, two aspects of the proposal didn’t get much press.
The first has to do with the oil fee. According to Gregoire’s staff, any fee on oil will be subject to the 18th amendment of the state constitution, which says that any fees or taxes on fuel must be spent on “highway purposes.” According to Gregoire staffer Jennifer Ziegler, Gregoire “wanted there to be a very clear nexus between the fee and the use of the fee on highway purposes. It really is for roads and ferries and stormwater retrofits.” That interpretation of the bill is a defeat for environmentalists, who have fought for a barrel fee in the past to pay for non-highway projects, such as cleaning up the Puget Sound.
The second element of the legislation that could create friction at the local level is in the provision allowing cities and counties to pass a motor vehicle excise tax of up to 1 percent or a vehicle license fee of up to $40. The governor’s office is working on language in the bill that would prevent two overlapping jurisdictions—say, Seattle and King County—from both passing either an MVET or a license fee. In other words, the legislation would go further than just barring two overlapping jurisdictions from passing the same kind of fee; it would also, for example, bar Seattle from passing an MVET if King County passed a license fee first.
The goal, Ziegler said, is to prevent the “piling on of fees” at the local level. But the language could set off an unintended arms race between cities and counties to be the first to grab up any local taxing authority.
Gregoire will release the language of the legislation early next week, Ziegler said.
