Guardian, you and I have disagreed in the past relative to growth. I must admit that you have brought me to the dark side, kinda.

Although I still believe that a certain amount of growth is inevitable because, after all is said and done, this is still one of the best cities in the world to live and raise a family. To actively pursue unlimited growth is starting to be really dumb!I think there is a logical arguement for attracting “selective” growth. That is specific businesses that will truly add to the economy. Light manufacturing comes to mind. While we may not be able to halt the growth, we should, no longer, go out of our way to attract it. We don’t need to spend any more money to “clog up” our infrastructure.

Editor: “The source of the revenue is not the important issue.”

I disagree. It may not be THE issue, but it’s significant.

I agree with Clancy. The road USERS (and wearer-outers) – including visitors from out-of-state – should all pay a fair share. It’s regressive to turn a “registration fee” into a tax. The registration fee rightly should only be the $ to process the registration.

Let me give you an example. Tell me if I’m wrong.

Family A has a 1992, half-ton pickup. Dad drives it back and forth to work almost every day. It accumulates 15,000 miles in a year.

Family B lives next door. They have an identical 1992 half-ton pickup. 350 days a year, it sits in the driveway. 3 days a year, it makes a trip to the dump. 10 days a year, it’s off on a family fishing/camping trip in the heart of Idaho’s beautiful back country. It accumulates 1500 miles in a year.

Why should Family A pay 1 cent per mile “registration fee,” and Family B spend 10 cents per mile?

The gas tax may not be totally fair as a way to spread the costs, but as a general rule, people who either: 1) drive a lot of miles on the roads, or 2) drive big, heavy gas-guzzlers will be burning more gallons than people who: 3) try to minimize their miles-driven, and 4) drive vehicles that sip the gas.

Other than that, I agree with your message. Better is better. (I think somebody said that before the big Fiesta Bowl game, too.)

EDITOR NOTE–I don’t disagree with anything you say. Does this mean you would tax bicycles for 10% of the cost of a highway based on the amount of pavement devoted to the two wheelers? 🙂

Cheap fuel and cheap housing away from population/work centers does contribute to sprawl and traffic.

It is hard to tax bike users when equal facilities don’t exist.

Don’t worry, knowing these people (the ones voted in), they will say $150 to take the sting out of the (plan of) $100. So the people will get screwed and be thankful for it.

Have you ever noticed how one can tell when they leave Oregon and touch Idaho by the sound of the tires and the (lack of) smoothness of the ride? Idaho highways are bad. We do not get what we pay for as it is…. and now they want more money. Not for better roads, but so folks can get a raise and more expensive desks.

What about a combination of tire, gas and registration fees? I commute by bicycle except in the winter and I wouldn’t mind paying a bike tire tax if I knew it was for new bike paths or re-surfacing the green belt. The problem with the flat tax, beloved idea of flat earth libertarian tards, is it treats all drivers the same. My neighbors 3/4 ton diesel mud monster pickup does a lot more damage to the road than my wife’s Ford Focus commuter sedan. Why not base the tax on tires for any vehicle on axel weight? Tires are rated for weight. That is how you pay for truck freight permits. A gas tax is fair. The more you use the more you pay. With the flat registration fee, Mr. Hummer gets subsidised by Mr. Ford Focus. That is exactly what Mr.Ford Extinction SUV driver wants. With a tire tax the more tires you wear out the more tax you pay. If you can shift annual flat registration taxes over to Grandma on a fixed income, with the cherry 64 Impala SS she only drives on Sunday with it’s second pair of tires or to the student with the clapped out Toyota Tercel driving to BSU from Meridian, you can be someones freemarket hero. (Remember, “freedom isn’t free”?) It’s about rubber hitting the road dude.

I think Otter is off his rocker on this proposal. His transportation official was quoted in the Daily Blab saying, “It’s a fair and simple way of taxing people.” Simple it is. Fair it is not. Any tax of this nature should be use based. Add a couple cents to the gas tax if you absolutely have to. Otter points to some neighboring states, like Montana, Nevada and Wyoming, where vehicle registration is over $300 per car. That is true. It is also true that Montana and Oregon have NO SALES TAX and Nevada and Wyoming have NO INCOME TAX. We in Idaho have ALL those taxes and the rates for them are NOT on the low side. It is way past time for the Idaho politicos to cut the fat and prioritize spending. With all the tax vehicles they have in this state, there should be plenty of dough to do what’s necessary if they would plan and spend wisely. Instead, we waste millions on stupid crap like the Statehouse submarine project.

Just a few comments, for now. For some of us the source of the revenue IS the major issue. Increased fees, sales taxes, value added taxes, and property taxes are not acceptable. If Butch wants our money, for whatever purpose, he should tax our income and nothing else.

Growth is also the major issue. More is seldom better, especially when it comes to people.

The ideas that come out of the Republican dominated government usually amaze me, and I’m usually shocked by the acceptance they receive.

For purposes of road building, a 1990 Buick and a 2008 Lexus count as 1 car and require the same amount of roadway. Maybe it’s time we all paid our share rather than asking the Lexus to subsidize the old Buick.

Dog – what you say is true, all other things being equal.

If the neighbor’s Mud Monster or Extinction sits in the driveway 350 days/year, and the more-responsible Ford Focus does 100 miles per day, 365, all bets are off. That’s why I lean toward the gas tax as the most equitable, while still relatively simple to administer. And simultaneously providing incentive to minimize on-highway miles, congestion, pollution, etc. (Oregon, as you probably know, is experimenting with GPS in a “Big Brother” notion to keep track of your miles, and tax you per mile driven in Oregon.)

Guardian… regarding your notion of taxing bicycles for using the roads, I’d be in favor if there were some way to make it fair. (Wear-and-tear on the roads, as inflicted by bicycles. We’re talkin’ some SERIOUS CABBAGE, huh? I wonder how long that concrete freeway to Caldwell would last, if it were bicycle-only.) I like to rationalize that since I give ACHD a couple hundred per year in PROPERTY TAX, I’ve already got that covered anyway.

Dave,

For people taking advantage of us.

Could you add a French Company for Nuclear that
no one ever heard of 6 weeks ago.

Back off Cyclops. By commuting on my bike I not only make room for your stinking single driver cage on the roads but I also free up parking for you where ever I go. 85% of my commute is on the Greenbelt. People riding bikes is a benefit to cagers like you. Cagers ought to kiss lycra bikers shorts becuase we actually save tax dollars. Like I say, it would be far cheaper to pay or make incentives for people who ride bikes than pouring new pavement and building more taxpayer funded parking. Our bicycles are not tearing up your roads and parking structures designed for and about your precious car culture. You get to park one or two stalls closer enhancing your pathetic Wal-Mart shopping experience, when you see bikes in the rack by the door, so you can go spend this nation down the toilet by buying imported Chinese crap soon to be on it’s journey to the taxpayer subsidized landfill.

WHOA Dog! Back away from the keyboard before you have a stroke! All that cycling has you on edge.
I am really glad you commute mostly on your bike, because emotionally, you are a prime candidate for road rage. All of a sudden I am a “stinking cager” who shops for Chinese stuff at Wal- Mart and fills the landfill needlessly!Let me thank you for giving ME the roads, parking structures, and the prime spot at Wal-Mart. I would wager that you were among the many, including me by the way, that lobbied for every road in town to have a dedicated bike lane. Now that it’s time to fix those roads, you want nothing to do with them. Those roads belong to ME now, I guess. So what is going to happen when I tell you to get off MY roads? Or what will your reaction be when I decide that we don’t actually need bike lanes any more, and if that means we knock off a couple of bikers a year, Oh Well, Collateral damage.
I am sorry you are having such a bad day. I think I’ll go for a bike ride on the green belt. After all, it IS a beautiful day!

Page 4 if government financial reports give you mego (my eyes glaze over).

Not to detract from the main point of registration fees, but since the highway system involves fiscal conservancy and complex economic issues here are some interesting (yes, perhaps slightly slanted) questions for discussion. Perhaps these will also provide future food for thought as well. In terms of the way that the Idaho Transportation Department does business it would be interesting to do some independently run studies on a few of these issues.

To what extent does the department contract or consult work out, and how has that changed in, say, the past 50 years? What balance of consulting/contracting work would be most cost effective to do in-house v. out? These questions are very political because there are some close ties between the business community and various government entities and because often the in-house work is sometimes discouraged because it takes business away from the private industry.

Also, there is a lot of personnel exchange between the transportation department and the business community. Sometimes there seems to be an effect of training ITD engineers and then losing them to consultants because ITD can’t increase their wages very well and consults pay better.

Feel free to discuss.

I’m with Bikeboy. The tax should correlate with usage. Like Bikeboy, I bike most of the year and use the ole pickup when I really need it. Why punish us? And don’t say it’s just like schools. We need to maintain what roads we have in the habital part of the infrastructure (in town) and not build new ones in the sprawl zones. A registration fee doesn’t send the right market signal. It’s just a regressive method to get some quick road building dough to keep up the fantasy of the American Car Culture Dream.