Minnesota Transportation Amendment
Vote Yes MN. Or not.
The proposed amendment:
An amendment to the Minnesota Constitution is proposed to the people. If the amendment is adopted, two sections will be added to article XIV to read:
“Sec. 12. Beginning with the fiscal year starting July 1, 2007, 63.75 percent of the revenue from a tax imposed by the state on the sale of a new or used motor vehicle must be apportioned for transportation purposes described in section 13, then the revenue apportioned for transportation purposes must be increased by ten percent for each subsequent fiscal year through June 30, 2011, and then the revenue must be apportioned 100 percent for transportation purposes after June 30, 2011.
Sec. 13. The revenue apportioned in section 12 must be allocated for the following transportation purposes: not more than 60 percent must be deposited in the highway user tax distribution fund, and not less than 40 percent must be deposited in a fund dedicated solely to public transit assistance as defined by law.”
I like the part about making sure transit gets adequate funding, and it makes sense that transportation-related taxes ought to be going to transportation funding. But, as this person puts it, “Specific funding being declared in the state constitution seems inappropriate to me.”
I mostly agree with the principle, but not so much with the method. So I shall Vote No MN.
[Further discussion at E-Democracy.Org, with lots of numbers and stuff]
Related posts:
nice post. this site is biased but provides lots of info too:
http://www.votenovehicletax.org/index2.php
I only ran across this in one place in a Star Tribune article from a couple weeks ago. The income that is to come from the sales tax portion of the amendment appears to already be dedicated to pay off the bonding that has already been taken and the proposed future bonding by the Pawlenty administration. The article states that the sales tax will be dedicated for the next 20 years fully and then it will take half of it for the following ten. If the general public votes for this amendment they will be expecting that this money will be coming in every year, when in reality it will be paying off projects that were done in the past for a long time to come. This article was the only place I have heard this information. Can anyone please verify? This is something that I do not think 99% of the people who may vote yes may realize.
Tom, I hadn’t read that particular item (although I do tend to glaze over a little whenever I do too much reading on this). Although it does make sense.
Hey, maybe if we pass this Amendment we can finally get that 62/35W project underway…. No? Okay then.
This Strib article on the crazy demand for park-and-riding mentions that transit proponents sure would be happy to have the extra funding that this Amendment would provide. As I’m sure Metro Transit would and I’d love for them to have the money. But, like I said, not via a Constitutional mandate.
Great post Erica, and interesting comments from everyone else. I have to admit that I really don’t know all the ins and outs of this issue, especially not having lived in Minnesota for almost eight years now. That also means I don’t know much about related issues in the Metro area (sprawl, urban blight, etc. Still, from what I’ve been reading transportation is a huge ongoing issue for the state, so I’m looking forward to more discussion on this topic. As per the amendment, I have to agree with those that are hesitant about puting budgetary and funding issues into the consitution. Good to hear there is so much support and desire for increases public transit though. Ultimately I think public transit is the best solution to transportation problems now and in the future.
This may seem obvious to some, and I know I don’t know all the ins and outs either, but I hope that people are getting the difference between “transportation” and “transit.”
I suppose if I lived anywhere outside the Metro, I wouldn’t be wild about designating funds to transit when all I’ve got to use are highways. Especially when those transit funds come at the expense of highway maintenance.
But I don’t, so give it up for transit!
Good point about living outside the Metro. Those of us who prefer “big city” life have to understand that the entire state will pay the taxes while only those who live in larger cities will recieve a direct benefit from the 40% going to transit. If I lived in a rural area I’d be pretty miffed about nearly half of a new tax I have to pay not doing anything for me right from the start.
And speaking of tax money didn’t the Cities just get a new stadium of some sort? I’d be interested in knowing the dollar figures between that and the total amount invested in transit.
Well, in this case, it wouldn’t be a new tax. Although there are proposals for increasing the gas tax floating around, I believe.
But you could make this argument for anything that happens in the Metro vs the rest of the state (like paying for stadiums). How many people from Duluth come down for Twins/Viking/Wild/T-Wolves games? How many people pay sales tax on going to (and eating/drinking at) those same games that ends up getting distributed elsewhere in the state? One could argue that vibrance of life in the Cities makes Minnesota as a whole a better place to live. And I’ll stop there, since we’re not talking about the stadium debates right now.
Again, it’s as much about the process as it is where the funds go/come from.
Link roundup at Roadguy.
You’re right, it isn’t a new tax, it’s about how current tax money gets used, my bad. Thanks for the link roundup. It’s nice to get a feel for who supports and opposes this amendment.
Given the fact that there has been way too little fact presented to the general public on this Amendment, my wife & I will be voting NO as well.
Seems to me that the General Fund will now be left short. Taxes will be raised to fill this gap…
And the way the amendment is written,(at least what I can find) is too vague. Reminds me of the way the Twins Stadium supporters got the Sales Tax levied w/o a referendum. Tiny loopholes will be the death of us (figuratively speaking).
Also, I was pretty miffed by voteyesmn.org last week. Contrary to MTC regulations, they felt it was OK to blanket 1000’s of vehicles in Park-n-Ride lots with flyers asking for a Yes vote on this amendmant. Transit officials assured me that voteyes had not received a waiver for this action & that they would see if a “Slap-of-the-hand” was warranted. I firmly suggested that a massive fine should be imposed. I am very skeptical that anything will be done. Why would MTC bite the hand that broke solicitation regs to feed them???