William C. Flook, The Examiner
2008-05-13 07:00:00.0
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WASHINGTON -

Gov. Tim Kaine proposed a series of tax increases Monday to help pay for the state's expanding highway maintenance deficit and pump new money into road and rail projects, but quickly ran into opposition from House Republican leaders and only tepid support from Senate Democrats.

The fees and taxes, Kaine told reporters, would raise nearly $1.1 billion a year for transportation by fiscal 2014, $512 million of which would go toward keeping up Virginia’s aging roads and bridges.

The governor will call lawmakers back to Richmond June 23 to consider the measures, which include a statewide 1 percent tax increase on car purchases, $10 increase to the annual car registration fee and a more than two-fold hike on the tax for selling a house.

Kaine also wants to raise the state’s 5 percent retail sales tax by 1 percent in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads, which would pay for local and regional projects in those congested urban regions. The increase would exclude food and medicine.

House Republican leaders accused Kaine of drumming up a panic over the maintenance deficit to pressure legislators into approving the tax increases, which they argued would drive up the cost of homes and cars and hurt two already ailing industries.

“I think it’s ill-timed,” said House Majority Leader Morgan Griffith, R-Salem, at a news conference. “But the governor has the prerogative to call us back into special session and waste the taxpayers’ dollars if he so desires to.”

The Senate's Democratic majority issued a statement outlining “concerns over some aspects of the plan” in the amount of funding and whether the proposal would adequately tax out-of-state drivers, who use the state’s roads.

Kaine’s plan did not include an increase in the gas tax.

Contained in the package is $50 million a year in dedicated funding for Metro, which the governor hopes will convince federal officials the transit system is funded well enough to handle the planned Dulles Rail’s 11.6-mile expansion into Fairfax County.

In selling the proposal, Kaine pointed to a bridge collapse in Minnesota last year that killed 13 people.

 “The consequences of not focusing on maintenance are very obvious and potentially severe,” he said.

 The taxes would be collected by the state and not by the regional taxing authorities that were empowered under last year’s transportation funding plan and this year declared unconstitutional by the Virginia Supreme Court.

wflook@dcexaminer.com