Efforts to generate more money to fix West Virginia’s crumbling roads and bridges failed during this year’s regular legislative session.
The Senate approved a bill raising another $300 million annually for highways by way of a one percent increase in the consumer sales tax, higher DMV fees and an increase in the wholesale tax on gasoline, but the House rejected the measure.
However, the legislature did pass a bill—and Governor Tomblin signed it last week—that gives individual counties a route to fix or build their own roads. HB 4009 empowers a county to finance a road construction project by adding on to the state’s six percent sales tax a “county transportation and use tax” up to an additional one percent.
The county would have to go through a series of steps to gain approval. Local officials must propose a project, hold a public hearing, submit the plan to the state highway department for approval and, most importantly, allow county voters to approve or reject the project through a referendum. A simple majority is needed for passage.
Monongalia County Republican Delegate Joe Statler was the lead sponsor, and he had been pushing the “Letting Our Counties Act Locally” bill for two years. “This will be another chance at helping yourself,” Statler said.
He believes counties that approve road bonds will be able to combine the additional revenue with state and even federal dollars to get the most funding available for a particular project.
Statler expects Monongalia County to have a project ready for a local road bond issue as soon as the 2018 Primary Election. An increase in the sales tax will be a tough sell, but the roads around Monongalia County are so bad that motorists might just be willing to pay a little more up front to keep their vehicles out of the repair shop and make their daily commute less like the driver’s version of dodge ball.
If it works in Monongalia County, other counties may want to give it a try, but that’s up to them. The anti-tax sentiment is strong and, given the economic challenges, it’s hard to imagine many counties where voters would be willing to swallow higher taxes.
Not every answer can, or will, come from Charleston or Washington and this is a way West Virginians can be empowered to make decisions about their own communities when it comes to #ftdr (fix the damn roads).