A revised version of House Bill 170 that aims to generate more than $1 billion in new funding for transportation is set to be unveiled Monday. Here are some of the expected changes as well as other developments that could come next week:
- Counties would be allowed to levy an excise tax of 6 cents per gallon on motor fuel by a vote of the county commission, with the proceeds being divided among cities and counties according to an existing formula. This replaces the current language in the bill that would allow each city and county government to vote to enact a 3-cents-per-gallon tax, plus another 3 cents by referendum.
- The proposed state excise tax on motor fuel of 29.2 cents per gallon is expected to be increased, although by how much is not clear.
- An official fiscal note estimating how much the bill could raise will be released next week. Supporters are concerned that the bill as written would generate $800 million to $850 million a year for the state, well short of the $1 billion goal.
- The revised bill could be approved by a House subcommittee Monday and the full Transportation Committee on Thursday, which would put the bill on the House floor by mid-February.
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House leaders on Monday will unveil a revised transportation plan to address concerns that the original bill hurt local governments and would not raise enough money, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has learned.
New details of the proposal came Friday from six people with direct knowledge of the negotiations who were not authorized to speak on the record.
An official state estimate of how much the bill would raise, known as a fiscal note, should be complete early next week. There is concern among supporters that, as written, House Bill 170 would fall up to $200 million short of the $1 billion a year that everyone from lawmakers to chambers of commerce to academics believe the state needs to meet its deepening infrastructure morass.
To help boost that bottom line, lawmakers will consider going higher than the 29.2 cents per gallon that the bill originally suggested for a state motor fuel tax. How high is not yet clear, but Gov. Nathan Deal is said to support the increase. While the governor's staff declined to comment Friday, Deal himself has hinted at the need for a bigger number.
In an interview this week, he said he supported an excise tax that would generate enough new money to fund new projects, but he didn’t say what that would be.
“Are you generating enough new revenue to be able to maintain the needs in the future, or are we simply doing one year at a time?” he said. “I would hope that now we that we have broached a very difficult and sensitive topic, we would see a package come out that would maintain that sustainability over more than one legislative session.”
In addition, the revised version of the bill would allow counties to levy an excise tax of 6 cents per gallon on motor fuel by a simple vote of the county commission. The revenue generated would be divided among counties and cities according to formulas already in place.
That 6-cents-per-gallon tax would replace what is currently in HB 170, which would allow each city and county to levy an excise tax of 3 cents per gallon by ordinance and add an additional 3 cents each by public referendum.
The change is expected to please some counties, who have been concerned about the impact on their bottom line. Whether it would satisfy cities and school districts, which have expressed opposition to the bill, is less clear.
In a weekly newsletter to its members, Georgia Municipal Association leaders expressed doubts about the proposed change.
“Under this revised funding scheme, city revenue for transportation projects would be available solely at the discretion of a county commission that decided to ‘raise gas taxes’ within the county,” GMA said. “Also, the (current) formula favors county roads by giving greater weight to centerline road miles over heavily traveled and congested multi-lane streets, often found in employment centers.”
All these changes are expected to be outlined at 2 p.m. Monday, when the bill's sponsor, Rep. Jay Roberts, R-Ocilla, presents them to a House Transportation subcommittee.
House leaders plan an aggressive timeline that would have the bill up for a vote in the House in the next few weeks. Roberts declined to comment Friday.
But at a subcommittee meeting Thursday, Roberts acknowledged local governments’ problems and committed to finding a way to solve them.
Left unchanged in the bill is a plan to charge a user fee for drivers of alternative-fuel vehicles. Personal vehicles would be subject to a $200 annual fee; business vehicles would be charged $300.
Still looming down the legislative road, however, is the Senate. Transportation Committee Chairman Tommie Williams, R-Lyons, on Friday questioned whether Roberts' revised plan is the way to go.
“I appreciate them working with the counties trying to solve the problem, but there may be other ways to do that,” Williams said.
“My goal is to make the counties whole, but I don’t want gas prices to be too high,” he said. “I don’t want gas prices to be the highest in the Southeast.”
North Carolina, at 37.75 cents per gallon, had the highest state gas tax in the region in 2014, according to the Washington-based Tax Foundation. Florida was next highest at 36.02 cents per gallon. Georgia’s 27.49 cents-per-gallon tax was the third-highest in the Southeast and 23rd-highest overall.
One idea Williams does support is multijurisdictional sales taxes. The idea is to allow two or more counties to band together to pass a 1 percent sales tax to pay for local transportation projects.
“I think it’s the right way to go,” Williams said.
Williams lives in one of the three districts in the state that passed a special local option sales tax for transportation in 2012 and said it’s worked well. Voters in metro Atlanta rejected a similar tax that year, in large part because voters in DeKalb County, for example, had different needs and wants than voters in Cobb County.
Williams said his plan would allow like-minded areas — think DeKalb and Fulton counties, or Cherokee and Forsyth counties — to band together on a smaller, more feasible scale.
“If you have one or two metro areas, in the smaller areas … people see what they’re getting for the money,” Williams said. “You’ll have plenty of money. I just think that’s a big part of the solution.”
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