Why I voted YES to raise SD vehicle registration fees

During the legislative session, I've been using this venue to share the rationale behind my bills and my votes. I welcome discussion and feedback.

In our House Transportation Committee meeting on Thursday, I voted for HB-1192 which will substantially raise vehicle registration fees in South Dakota. The vote was 11-1. My vote may come as a surprise to some who know me as a card carrying member of the don't raise taxes club. But user fees are not the same as taxes. The Governor has said he will veto tax increases but I suspect he'd sign on to this fee increase, as did I. But I don't know for sure.

Here's a look at road conditions in South Dakota (slides courtesy the Dept of Transportation)…

The next little slide shows it takes three times the amount of money to turn a fair condition road back into excellent condition as it takes to keep a excellent road in excellent condition. In other words, the longer we wait to fix the roads, the more money it will take.

Roads are not an item in the general budget and so all the emails I'm getting that connect education and medicaid cuts with road cuts are apples and oranges. Main road funding sources are gas taxes, vehicle excise taxes, wheel taxes and vehicle registration fees. Vehicles get better gas mileage and so revenues from taxing gas are down. Road repair and construction costs go up and up every year. Gravel costs in the last five years have gone up from $8 to $12 per yard. THE LAST TIME WE RAISED GAS TAXES WAS 12 YEARS AGO (1999). Even so, I would have voted no on increasing the gas tax.

Vehicle registration fees in South Dakota are ridiculously low. I'll just give just one example but it's the same story for every vehicle model. Right now, a 2006 Buick Lacerne license fee in SD is $44. Our neighbors to the south in Nebraska pay $362.50 for that same vehicle. Just over the state line to the east they pay $242. In Iowa, it's $270. In Wyoming it's $243. In Montana it's $304.77. But again, here in South Dakota it's only $44. Even North Dakota is double that… $93.

HB-1192 raises the fee for a non-commerical car or truck 2001-4000 pounds from $41 to $51 dollars effective July 1, 2011.  On July 1, 2013 it increases the fee to $60.  Commercial vehicle fees do not change under HB-1192. This fee increase raises an additional $18.1 million in 2011 for roads (67% goes to counties, 16% goes to cities, 17% goes to townships). In 2013, the total increase to these local governments is $31 million per year. HB-1192 also changes the 30% older vehicle discount to vehicles 10 years or older. At present, the older vehicle discount applies to vehicles five years or older. Here's a look at a vehicle in the year the 30% reduction for five year old vehicles passed. A five year old vehicle today is NOT old. Heck, the way I buy cars, a five year old car IS a NEW car.

Roads are the lifeblood to our state's two biggest revenue generators - agriculture and tourism. The bottom line is we've only had one increase in revenue for roads in twenty years but our road construction costs have increased every year these last twenty years. I've been privy to numerous briefings from the Department of Transportation and Township and Municipalities, etc, etc and I've reviewed the findings from the summer study last year and the DOT and the legislature HAVE done their job to find efficiencies and cut costs. The DOT is lean today - ten years ago they went from 1300+ FTEs to 950+ and have about 1000 today. However, there are no other avenues to deal with this problem considering how roads are funded EXCEPT raise fees or taxes.

Before I show some pics of the problem I will say that right now only 43 of the 66 counties in South Dakota have a wheel tax. And that means Minnehaha/Lincoln County residents (Sioux Falls) are paying for roads in Pennington County (Rapid City) as Pennington County doesn't have a wheel tax. This needs to change real soon. If you live in the following counties, you are NOT doing your part and we in the other counties are are bearing the greater burden… Pennington, Lawrence, Bon Homme, Buffalo, Campbell, Clark, Clay, Corson, Dewey, Edmunds, Fall River, Hand, Hanson, Harding, Hyde, Jackson, Jones, Kingsbury, McPherson, Meade, Potter, Shannon, and Todd.  Again, those are the 23 non-wheel tax counties. The remaining 43 counties have a wheel tax.

The following pictures illustrate why the time to substantially raise vehicle registration fees is right now.

Here is a black top road that has gone back to dirt. (pics courtesy of the Beadle County Highway Department and the South Dakota Local Transportation Assistance Program.)

 

In South Dakota transportation circles, we are talking about de-paving roads. De-paving. We are talking about only mowing 8 feet of ditch instead of 16 feet. We are talking about reducing winter maintenance by sending crews out at 7am instead of at 5am and pulling them off the road earlier at night. That will affect you getting to work in the morning. The choice is really between less services and dangerous roads or paying more in fees or taxes.

A typical county has 64 miles of roads but can only pay for 2 miles of gravel road upkeep a year. That means only once in 30 years. Counties can only replace one bridge a year. A typical county has 140 bridges, 75% are past their preferred lifetime. There are 3200 statewide. That means, at present funding levels, some bridges will not get attention in this century.  Here are a few bridge pictures from our fine state. These are in Beadle County.

Note the date on this rusty bridge pic is 2002. This bridge has since been closed and still has not been repaired. When these bridges were built, they were built to hold the biggest tractors being made at that time. Here's a pic of one of those tractors.  Today the equipment going over these bridges dwarfs the vehicles of fifty years ago. And this is the result…

…both these bridge failures were in Brown County…

In north and northeast South Dakota flooding has damaged roads in numerous counties. FEMA money was insuffient to rebuilt these roads.  More flooding is on the way this year.

Many of these roads are impassible today.

I'll wrap up here by telling something that happened in east central South Dakota last October. A semi-full of grain pulled out of a field and went over an old bridge on the northwest side of Lake Byron. The bridge failed, it bowed, and the car behind it barely made it across (see the pic at the link above). Coming the other way was a school bus full of kids and the driver of the car stopped the bus to point out the failing bridge. The bridge fell when a Beadle County road worker walked across it.

I'd rather answer today to a few frustrated conservatives about why I voted yes to raise vehicle registration fees than I would explain a no vote the day after a bus load of school kids tipped on it's side into a river due to a failed bridge.

FYI- a similar vehicle registration fee raise passed the House in 2009 but failed in the Senate. This year the vehicle registration fee increase is back in the form of HB 1211 and again, it passed the Transportation Committee on Thursday 11-2. It was amended so it won't hit the House floor until Tuesday. I'm hopeful it'll pass there and get through the Senate as well.