Key legislators involved in crafting a bill to raise the state tax on motor fuel by a dime a gallon say the legislation will include an attempt to rein in county borrowing for road and bridge projects.
Representative Josh Byrnes, a Republican from Osage, says Black Hawk County, for example, has borrowed over 35 million dollars for transportation-related projects in the past seven years. Byrnes, who is chairman of the House Transportation Committee, says the problem is many roads will have to be repaired or even replaced long before residents have paid back the 30-year bond for the original project.
Senator Tod Bowman, a Democrat from Maquoketa, is chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee. Bowman says the bill to raise the gas tax likely will include a call for counties to match the length of their loans to the “life-expectancy” of the road or bridge.
Bowman and Byrnes discussed the issue Friday, during taping of Iowa Public Television’s weekly “Iowa Press” program. Iowans for Tax Relief founder David Stanley, a critic of the fuel tax hike, was also a guest. Stanley says the gas tax is the most regressive tax the state levies.
Other groups, like Americans For Prosperity, argue state policymakers should prioritize state spending and divert three-and-a-half percent of all the other taxes the state collects into the gas tax fund which is used exclusively for road projects. Supporters of the gas tax increase say that will pit roads against other priorites, like spending on schools and the mentally ill, and the gas tax is a user fee that is also paid by out-of-state motorists and truckers who drive on Iowa roads.
