Ken Mammarella July 19, 2022 Government, Headlines
Delaware is among the states considering the use of mileage-based user fees to replace revenue lost from gas taxes as the country turns to electric vehicles. Photo by Chuttersnap/Unsplash.
As state and federal leaders push to get more electric vehicles on the road and lower the consumption of fossil fuels, a reckoning will come about how to pay for roads if nobody is buying gasoline at the pump.
Taxes on the sale of gasoline fund a huge portion of roadwork, including repaving and safety concerns, and the push is on to ban the sale of all new gasoline and diesel-fueled vehicles by 2035.
One way that Delaware is exploring how to recoup that revenue — already under pressure from increasing numbers of high-mileage vehicles — is through user fees that bill drivers for the amount of miles a car is driven, based on a device installed in the car.
The focus on how to pay for roads received a push in March when Gov. John Carney’s administration joined 13 other states on California’s Advanced Clean Cars II initiative.
It “calls for banning the sale of all new gasoline and diesel-fueled vehicles by 2035,” said Joseph Fulgham, director of policy and communications for the Delaware House Republican Caucus.
“All new passenger cars, trucks and SUVs sold in Delaware that year will need to be zero emissions. That being the case, it is inevitable that Delaware’s vehicle fuel tax – the main method for funding the Transportation Trust Fund that pays for road construction and all of DelDOT’s operational expenses – will be forced to transition to some other funding mechanism well before then.”
In a February discussion of DelDOT’s budget, Rep. Ruth Briggs King, a Republican from Georgetown, asked about the issue.
“What is the right method for these electric vehicles?” DelDOT Secretary Nicole Majeski responded. “Is a mileage-based user fee the right method for them or is some other sort of fee associated with that? Because as you mentioned, they’re not contributing to the motor fuel tax but they are still contributing to the wear and tear of our infrastructure.”
Whatever happens will take many steps.
For instance, Carney doesn’t have the authority to commit to the initiative, said David T. Stevenson, director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Policy for the Caesar Rodney Institute, a conservative Delaware think tank.
Delaware is part of The Eastern Transportation Coalition, which since 2018 has been studying a mileage-based user fee, with real-world pilots, public opinion surveys, focus groups and data analysis. Among those groups, the user fee is shortened to MBUF as an acronym and pronounced em-buff.
Key conclusions from its latest report :
It’s up to elected leaders to decide on the politically charged complexities of when and how to change and what dollar figures to allocate to various fees.
Part of the coalition’s mission has been studying public knowledge and perception.
Its turns out that there’s not a lot of either.
In 2019, the coalition asked Delawareans how much a gallon of gas — then $2.17 — was. Most did not know.
And 75% were not familiar with the mileage-based system, according to Lisa Miller of the coalition.
One simple linguistic move designed to encourage support is calling it a user fee, not a tax.
“The public reaction to this is very negative, as it should be,” coalition executive director Patricia Hendren told the a television station in 2017.
The coalition is neutral about the user fee, and Hendren told WHYY in 2019 that the current fuel tax is “actually more of a regressive tax on lower-income households and folks living in rural areas, where they typically have older, less fuel-efficient vehicles, so they’re paying more.”
A user fee could have that same effect, too, said Caesar Rodney Institute’s Stevenson.
“The lower half of the income spectrum” are likely to be more burdened by that fee, Stevenson said.
“They don’t get to choose to drive less or have public transportation available,” he said.
Examples he cited include service workers driving long distances on crowded roads from western Sussex to all the jobs in the eastern part of the county, he said, and people commuting from southern New Castle and northern Kent to jobs in northern New Castle.
The coalition’s latest study was based on being revenue-neutral: a vehicle operating at the national average of 23 mpg would pay a user fee equal to the amount paid for state fuel taxes
But that neutrality is only for this hypothetical and the overall collection.
The reality is that some drivers – depending on their driving habits, the efficiency of their vehicles and other factors – will pay more in user fees than they did in fuel taxes. And some would pay less.
“A shift to MBUF is estimated to change household expenses, regardless of geography, by about $1.50 a month,” the report concluded.
The coalition this year is diving deeper into the issue with a geographic equity analysis in Delaware, New Jersey, North Carolina and Pennsylvania, comparing the habits of rural vs. urban drivers.
Delaware’s basic gas tax is 23 cents per gallon, which easily converts to 1 cent per mile in coalition studies. If a tiered rate existed, the user fee could range from 1.44 to 0.70 cents per mile, depending on mpg, and 40 cents per mile for electric vehicles.
Delaware’s tax on special fuels – all other fuels placed into a licensed motor vehicle – is 22 cents per gallon. They’ve been at that level since 1995.
Federal taxes are 18.4 cents per gallon for gas, 24.4 cents for diesel.
For fiscal 2023, DelDOT projects the motor fuel tax to generate $146.9 million, or 14% of its $1.019 billion budget. That brings the revenue to just above where it was in fiscal 2019, following pandemic-related dips in the two years in between.
But as more hybrids and electric vehicles are put into use, revenue from a fuel tax will decline.
DelDOT’s other key funding sources are the federal government (32%), Department of Motor Vehicle revenues (23%), I-95 tolls (14%) and Route 1 tolls (6%).
Pennsylvania’s Transportation Revenue Options Commission, created by Gov. Tom Wolf in 2021, called the user fee “a long-term fix” but concluded that Pennsylvania needed to make some short-term fixes. There, the gas tax generates 78% of Pennsylvania’s transportation revenue.
Privacy was the most important issue for the technology in one coalition survey, and such concerns have declined after people became more familiar with how the user fee will be calculated.
A 2020-21 coalition study recruited rural drivers and privacy advocates in Delaware. It used devices plugged into the on-board diagnostic port.
A third of the drivers chose GPS-enabled devices that would allow, among other things, to allocate mileage and revenue for out-of-state driving.
Such out-of-state mileage turned out to be 14% of the Delaware drivers’ miles. Both types of devices can crunch numbers that might be helpful (say, battery voltage) and numbers that some might call intrusive (how smoothly you drive).
The GPS-enabled devices were promoted for “added-value features” including the ability to set up geographic zones and see when the car enters and exits the zone and share trip logs with friends.
“Since implementation of the mileage fee will require a long phase- in period, a complete mileage fee collection system must find a way for some motorists not to pay both charges (mileage fee and fuel tax) while other motorists pay only one (the fuel tax),” Oregon concluded back in 2007. “The way to manage this problem is to provide a credit against some other tax or fee payment, such as the income tax or auto registration fees, surely a cumbersome and non-user friendly approach.
Majeski said in a statement released with the coalition report that Delaware continues to support the commitment of The Eastern Transportation Coalition to explore alternatives for funding the transportation infrastructure.
“The coalition’s work on this issue is providing valuable data that will inform our decision making as we look to the future,” she said.
Corie Priest of the Delaware Attorney General’s Office welcomes a student returning to Eastside Charter Tuesday. More than 40 teachers, politicians and members of the community gathered Tuesday to form a welcome crew for students returning to Eastside Charter School for the first time since March 2020. The 483 students, mostly minorities, reacted in a variety of ways to being steered between the two lines of suited cheerleaders waiting to greet and elbow bump them on their way into the school doors: delighted, confused, shy, a bit frightened. It’s the fifth year that CEO Aaron Bass has started the first day of school with a “Suit Up Show Up” honor guard. Five years ago, he asked professional Black men to participate as an example both of support for the students and what they could achieve through education. He’s gradually widened the circle to include members of the community who want to encourage the students. “It’s so important that children see the community rally around them,” Bass said. That’s even more true now, he said, as the community deals with the pandemic, a rise in violence and the impact of flooding from the remnants of Ida. Two blocks from the school, streets were lined with piles of household debris from the flood. Among those at Eastside were Wilmington Mayor Mike Purzycki, Wilmington City Council member James Spadola, Sen. Elizabeth “Tizzy” Lockman, D-Wilmington, and Rep. Valeria Longhurst, D-Bear and many members of Eastside’s board. State Rep. Valerie Longhurt, D-Bear, prepares to bump elbows with a returning Eastside Charter student. Purzycki said he couldn’t say no to such a great opportunity. “If you just realize you’ve got all these little bright, bright potential magnificent citizens coming in,” Purzycki said, “I think they’re getting a little bit of love from the people who are supposed to be important. You know, they’re important.” Lockman said she thought the welcome was a boost for the kids. “But I think it’s probably even more of a boost for all of us just to be able to come out and support them, support the teachers, support great school leaders like Aaron, and, you know, just mark this turning point of the year where we’re back to school,” she said. “Things have been so haywire for so long … It’s nice to have a feel good moment in the midst of all of this.” Former Judge Charles H. Tolliver IV, an Eastside board member, said he thought the traditional welcome was particularly important in the current environment. “People care and people want to say have a good time, get an education, because that’s the only way out for anybody,” Tolliver said. He thought Tuesday’s crowd of welcomers was equal to or bigger than the first year’s group. Students milling around waiting for school doors to open at 7:30 a.m. were watching the guests greet each other and line up. About 40 members of the community and Eastside board showed up to greet children returning to the building for the first time since March 2020. Third grader Briasia Tann said she was happy to be back in person. “I haven’t seen my teachers in a long time,” she said. She also said she was worried that her friends have forgotten her. Quimere Williams said he was happy to be back, too. “It’s easier to do the work,” he said. Quiaire Chambers, who is in sixth grade, said he wasn’t particularly happy to be back in the classroom. He really liked being able to participate in virtual classes from the comfort of his bed, he said. Bass had a special guest Tuesday: His mother, Elsa Johnson Bass of Philadelphia, came to watch the official welcome for her 71st birthday. Bass had surprised her the day before with an early birthday present, and she said she wanted to surprise him back. “The community support is amazing,” she said.
When the General Assembly passed a record-setting $1.3 billion bond bill last week, the spending package did not include a list of the $70 million in projects chosen by legislators for their districts. The Community Redevelopment Fund includes one-time allocations which legislators earmark for nonprofits, schools and community agencies in their districts. Ordinarily, each organization receiving funding would have its own line item within the Bond Bill. This way, if a legislator should object to particular recipients of funding, they could vote accordingly. But this year, because of the amount of funds available and the number of organizations that applied, the total $70 million fund was listed as one line-item under the assurance that the list of recipients would be made public once finalized. Both the House and Senate passed the budget, and Gov. John Carney signed it without the list. Some legislators say the list should be included in the Bond Bill as a matter of transparency so it could be presented to the public before a vote. Others say the decisions had already been made but the list itself had not been collated, and that in order to meet the June 30 deadline, this was how it had to be done. Rep. Jeff Spiegelman, R-Clayton, argued that while he recognizes the unique challenges the state faced this year because of the unusually large budget, structural problems were revealed within the bond process itself. “This year proved that the bond structure was ill-equipped to handle the amount of money we had. What this has resulted in is essentially a gentlemen’s agreement with tens of millions of taxpayer dollars on the line,” said Spiegelman. “This is the very definition of pork-barrel-spending, where legislators have this big pile of cash and they’re forced to play a game of ‘come and grab it’ for these funds.” Sen. Nicole Poore, D-New Castle, disagreed. She said the list should be out soon, “hopefully by the end of this week.” “Rep. Spiegelman might choose not to take any money for his district if that’s how he feels about it,” Poore said “I don’t know why Rep. Spiegelman would make such a comment but I bet his colleagues wouldn’t feel so favorable about him saying that.” She said everybody who has served on the Bond Committee has been committed to helping their communities. “For the first time, we have the ability to do that,” Poore said. “If you look at what we did on the line items, the amount of infrastructure that we are building, and the amount of people we are putting back to work, especially after this pandemic, it’s overwhelming and it’s a great feeling.” “Sen. Poore does more to prove what I’m saying than I think she realizes,” Spiegelman said. “It’s a classic carrot-and-stick situation, where the carrot is the support for your district and the stick is the bond bill,” said Spiegelman. Sen. Brian Pettyjohn, R-Georgetown, Senate minority leader, said that there was “nothing untoward going on” and that this year, “for time’s sake, the decision was made to combine them all into one line item.” “Of course I’d like to see them published prior, but this was the best option for this year,” said Pettyjohn. Rep. Lyndon Yearick, R-Camden, said he would prefer the list be made available before the vote, but because it’s such a small amount relative to the entire Bond Bill, it’s not a huge issue. “People will be able to see the effects of this spending in their communities and can make a decision then,” he said. Yearick compared community redevelopment funds to community transportation funds, which are not enumerated upfront but are allocated at the discretion of individual legislators throughout the fiscal year. He and others were more frustrated that even with the unprecedented surplus of $1.2 billion, there was no money given back to taxpayers in the form of tax relief or rebate. “We provided zero dollars in tax relief into the hands of Delaware taxpayers who have suffered, some more than others, during the pandemic with regard to their livelihood, their businesses, their jobs, their mortgages,” Yearick said. “And yet we just spent $500 million like it’s nothing.” Sen. Colin Bonini, R-Frederica, supported passing the Bond Bill without the finalized list, and noted that he would have “absolutely supported giving money back to the taxpayers.” Bonini has sponsored numerous bills throughout his 26 years in the Senate to do just that. Poore said she would have to wait and see a proposal to either cut taxes or return money to taxpayers in the form of rebates. She said the proposal “isn’t anything new” and would have to see the legislation before she could comment further. Poore said she didn’t know if this year’s surplus is something “we will ever see again,” partly because so much of it stemmed from federal COVID-19 relief. Spiegelman retorted: “I didn’t know Senator Poore had a crystal ball.”
As Delaware LIVE News closes in on its second anniversary as a locally-owned news business focused on hyperlocal news and information across the First State, the company welcomes Jarek Rutz to the newsroom as its premier education journalist. “Our communities have been proactively engaging in their local schools at an unprecedented level and we intend to provide detailed reporting of the depth of viewpoints that exist,” said Delaware LIVE News CEO Bryan Shupe. “The discussions surrounding student proficiency, career and job readiness, curriculum content, allocation of funding and school board elections will be brought forth through traditional journalism to engage a well-rounded dialogue about Delaware’s education system.” Raised in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, Jarek earned a B.A. in journalism and a B.A. in political science from Temple University in 2021. After running CNN’s Michael Smerconish’s YouTube channel, Jarek became a reporter for the Bucks County Herald before joining Delaware LIVE News. “I have always had a passion for education. My father is a lifelong teacher, and my sister is a teacher in Philadelphia,” said Rutz. “Education paves the way to economic and social prosperity, and it is vital that residents of Delaware know more about the local decisions and discussions that have real impact on their daily lives.” Jarek can be reached at [email protected] In just under two years, Delaware LIVE has strengthened its hyperlocal approach to community news throughout the First State with a focus on Delaware’s difference makers and local entrepreneurs. With the acquisitions of Town Square LIVE, in the Hockessin, Pike Creek, North Wilmington and Brandywine Hundred region; and Milford LIVE, in Kent and Sussex County, the company has reinforced its commitment to engage local residents with their local schools, businesses, government, healthcare and communities. In addition, Delaware LIVE Sports connects First State families with their favorite Delaware high school teams and players on a daily basis as they livestream sports in each county, focusing on fall, winter and spring seasons. Delaware LIVE’s three digital Weekly Reviews deliver customized local news through email, while the company’s three hyperlocal websites and social media platforms interact with readers throughout the day. Readers can sign up here for their own free subscription of the reviews.
This tree in Winterthur’s Yuletide tour recreates one that Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis created in the White House. Winterthur’s big exhibit for 2022 will bring Jackie O to Delaware. “Jacqueline Kennedy and Henry Francis du Pont: From Winterthur to the White House,” which runs May 7 to Jan. 8, 2023, will follow the former First Lady and the country’s biggest collector of Americana in renovating and restoring the White House when John Fitzgerald Kennedy became president. Among other exhibits will be the dress that Jackie wore when she gave the television tour of the White House after the work was done. At the time, it was the most-watched television program. Elaine R. Bachmann The exhibit is based on the research of Elaine Rice Bachmann, who earned her master’s in Winterthur’s and the University of Delaware’s Early American Culture Program, in 1993. The program requires a thesis, which often focus on a single a historic object, but Bachmann realized that the archives had copies of all the letters that Jackie and du Pont wrote to each other about the project. She was particularly interested in the connection because her mother frequently talked about how interesting and impressive Jackie’s television show had been. “The archives had collected all of Mr. Du Pont’s correspondence with Mrs. Kennedy and all the materials related to it,” she said. “So it was sitting right there, but no one had really critically looked at it yet as an academic exercise.” She was lucky, she said, that there were so many people still living who remembered or were involved in it, including the late John A. H. Sweeney, the former chief curator of Winterthur. A table near the White House tree features photos showing Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis with Winterthur owner Henry Francis du Pont. Bachmann, now Maryland state archivist and commissioner of land patents, went on to co-author “Designing Camelot: The Kennedy White House Restoration” with James Archer Abbot. H.F. du Pont had fallen in love with American-made furniture and was one of the first people to champion using American goods and to focus on American style rather than English or French. He and Jackie traveled in similar circles, but didn’t socialize. By the early 60s, many of the furnishings of the White House formal rooms were worn. The country’s youngest First Lady, who was 31, described the White House’s interior as a combination of “dentist office and bomb shelter.” She wanted to restore their splendor with a re-do that also restored the sense of history and elevated it into place of pride for the entire country. Jackie asked du Pont — then 80 — to be head of her advisory committee. By doing so, she not only gained access to his enthusiasm and expertise, but also his connections among collectors, museum experts, academic experts and auction houses. Their restoration awakened a national interest in historic preservation and interior design that is still felt today. Jacqueline Onassis with Henry Francis du Pont, in gray suit, and committee to renovate White House. The Winterthur exhibit will use artifacts, archives and images to allow visitors to experience the behind-the-scenes collaboration between the two during this captivating period in American history. “H. F. du Pont’s role in the Kennedy restoration of the White House positions Winterthur and its influence on American preservation and interiors at the center of this story,” said Alexandra Deutsch, the John L. and Marjorie P. McGraw Director of Collections at Winterthur. “Mrs. Kennedy’s iconic visit to Winterthur launched her on a path of creating the White House we know today. The interiors of the museum helped shape that lasting vision, which she enacted in just three short years.” One of the displays on this year’s Winterthur Yuletide tour is a nod toward the upcoming exhibit. At the foot of the Montmorency staircase sits a decorated tree recreating the one displayed at the White House in 1962, created by the First Lady. With the theme of a “Children’s Christmas,” it features candles, birds, snowflakes, angels, tiny twig stars, small wrapped gifts, reindeer, candy canes, stuffed animals, and a model PT-109 boat commemorating the president’s heroic deed during World War II. Also sitting nearby are photos of Jackie and du Pont, which will be featured in the exhibit.
An email from a Democrat staff says the special session is likely to be in September and may deal with issues other than redistricting.
Copyright © 2021 Townsquare Live Founded in 2011