Lawmakers allow counties to enact sales taxes for roads
PHOENIX — With gas tax revenues lagging, state lawmakers are moving to allowing all 15 counties to levy their own sales taxes to pay for critical road and transit needs.
SB 1147, approved by the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, would specifically allow those counties that already have such a tax to seek voter approval for an extension. That is designed to help not only build or repair existing roads but build out the mass transit system that didn’t get funded when the recession cut into existing tax revenues.
Potentially more significant, it would provide for the first time ever that same option to rural counties that until now have been totally dependent on the money they get from the state to pave new roads, repair existing ones and, to the extent they want it, some form of mass transit.
Those funds are not keeping pace with needs, with the gasoline tax having remained at 18 cents a gallon since 1991. And state lawmakers, looking for cash during the recession, have diverted some of those dollars to finance the Highway Patrol.
Read more: https://www.dcourier.com/news/2018/mar/10/lawmakers-allow-counties-enact-sales-taxes-roads/
