GOP, Dems refine transit plans to court other side as General Assembly resumes

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - Both sides of a deadlocked transportation funding debate in Richmond will reshape and refine their tax proposals as the Virginia General Assembly picks up its special session today.

Democratic leaders plan to drop a proposed statewide gas tax increase, while Republicans withdraw a plan to make local governments raise some of the revenue.

The two surviving transportation packages before legislators have been crafted with amendments that proponents hope will bridge the gap between the two camps.

House and Senate Democrats announced a compromise that strips out a fuel tax increase of a penny a year for six years, which would have raised nearly $300 million annually by 2015. The bill would still raise $5.5 billion over the next seven years through a combination of other statewide and regional levies, according to estimates.

The gas tax has been the single largest target of House Republicans, who have consistently killed bills that attempt to increase it beyond the current 17.5 cents per gallon.

House GOP leaders are pushing a bill that would raise money solely in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads to replace the regional revenues tossed out by the Virginia Supreme Court from a 2007 transportation package.

That plan, however, would have required localities to raise some of the taxes and would have shifted money from the Port of Virginia in Norfolk to regional Hampton Roads highway funding. Northern Virginia officials joined together to attack the bill in a letter to lawmakers on Monday.

Under the amended version, 25 percent of the port revenue would pay for transportation in Northern Virginia and another 25 percent would go to the rest of the state’s transportation districts, according to the bill’s patron, Del. Phil Hamilton, R-Newport News.

And all of the bill’s four new proposed tax increases — to the grantor’s tax, hotel tax, $100 driver’s license fee and car rental tax — would be collected by the state, as opposed to only the last two, said Del. Dave Albo, R-Springfield, who helped draft the legislation and amendments.

“The Democrats’ major objection has been having the localities impose [the taxes],” Albo said. “I’m giving them what they’ve been asking for.”

Bob Chase, president of the Northern Virginia Transportation Alliance, called the revisions “progress.”

“The key is going to be the extent to which the House Republican leadership allows full debate and the ability to amend and improve upon these proposals,” he said.

wflook@dcexaminer.com

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