Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann unveiled a plan last week that would allow counties to implement a 2-cent to 6 -cent gas tax exclusively for local roads and bridges.
The Board of Supervisors would have to vote to put the issue on the ballot and then county voters would decide on it.
Of course, all that is pending Hosemann winning the race for lieutenant governor and the Legislature agreeing to his plan.
But it’s an interesting new concept that addresses what is undoubtedly the top complaint among Marion County residents: bad roads. And there’s just not enough revenue coming in to keep up what we have, no matter how well the money is managed.
And the proposal has a good chance of becoming law. Why? Hosemann, as the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor, is the odds-on favorite to be the next leader of the Mississippi Senate. The state House has been more open to infrastructure plans, but current Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves has shot down most efforts in the Senate. With a new lieutenant governor more open to doing something about the state’s road and bridge crisis, it’s much more likely to get through the Legislature. Of course, if Reeves is governor, he might use his veto power to block the tax. We’ll have to see how things play out between Reeves and Democratic Attorney General Jim Hood in the Nov. 5 governor’s race.
In the meantime, the details of Hosemann’s proposal, which he unveiled at Dunn Roadbuilders in Petal on Sept. 19, seem well thought out.
A majority of the county’s supervisors would have to opt to put it on the next general election ballot as a referendum. The language would specify the projects the funds would be allocated toward, and the tax would stop after those projects were completed.
“Right now, we have more than 420 local bridges closed due to disrepair. Our counties and communities need solutions, and this proposal puts the power in the hands of the voters, where it belongs,” Hosemann said in a statement. “Mississippi should be run from the counties and not in the Capitol.”
He said all the money would go directly to the county and could only be used for repair and maintenance of existing roads and bridges, not new construction, equipment or salaries. The funds could also not be used to reduce current road and bridge spending.
I’ve advocated strongly over the past couple of years in this space for increasing the state’s 18.4-cent gas tax. The reasons are obvious: It hasn’t been changed since 1987, since which inflation has greatly increased the costs of road maintenance yet the revenue is flat because the number of gallons of gas used has remained constant or decreased because of greater fuel efficiency in vehicles. It’s an inherently fair tax because everyone who drives on the roads helps pay for them. And infrastructure is one of the most functions of government; even small-government advocates, such as myself, agree it’s proper to facilitate transportation.
Yet state leaders have stubbornly blocked common sense efforts, pushed by the business community, because they think it gives them political mileage to adamantly oppose any tax hike, no matter how needed it is for improving the economy and quality of life in their state.
Yet perhaps Hosemann’s support of the local option gas tax shows that state leaders are beginning to see that stubborn opposition to any gas tax increase is starting to become a political liability as more and more roads and bridges crumble.
While I like the 2- to 6-cent local gas tax idea, which I think voters in Marion and most other counties would gladly vote to pay if it meant better roads that they drive on daily, the plan does not change the overall need for a state gas tax increase to repair state highways and bridges.
Leadership from elected representatives is needed from the top to make that happen, not passing the buck on every touchy issue to voters on the local level.
Charlie Smith is editor and publisher of The Columbian-Progress. Reach him at (601) 736-2611 or csmith@columbianprogress.com.
