From: Robbie Webber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 16:19:36 -0500
> Borrowing less for major transportation projects and rehab sounds OK - less debt incurred for big highways. But the part about paying for debt service out of general funds instead of transportation $$ seems wrong. Anyone else have thoughts? > I'm afraid this is already a done deal and it's quite complicated. It has to do with the governor's using $550 million from the Transportation Fund this year to "solve" the state budget deficit. The Republicans and the roadbuilders were terribly upset about the governor doing that, since they live by the rule that the money that's collected via the gas tax and vehicle license registration fees, and goes into the transportation fund, ought only be used for transportation purposes (highways for the most part, of course). So when Governor Doyle shifted the $550 million to solve the problems with the general fund, they plotted and schemed to get it back. What Doyle must have done also was to raise the debt limit for borrowing for highways to $1 B, figuring that's how DOT could make up the difference. But the Republicans want nothing to do with having to borrow money for transportation projects when they had the money sitting in the transportation fund to pay for them already (before Doyle took it out). The Republicans didn't have the legal basis to force the governor to put the $550 million back into transportation, but they evidentially did think they had a case for suing Doyle about his having increased the bonding limit to $1 B w/o Legislative authorization. Doyle must have thought they had a good chance to win that case and embarrass him in doing so, so agreed to having $69.9 million of debt for the $550 in highway projects paid every year (starting in 2005) from the general fund (until the full $550 million is paid up I guess), and to vow never to take public tax money out of the highway fund again for purposes other than transportation. This all sound very devious (smelly) to me, too. The state collects taxes from other specific purchases (cigarettes; beer, wine, hard liqueur) without giving all that money back for smoking and drinking purposes. So while must the state only use money collected from gasoline for highway driving purposes? http://www.madison.com/archives/read.php?ref=wsj:2003:10:21:285131:LOCAL/ WISCONSIN And now I see that Dane County and Kathy Falk want to include a regressive wheel tax of $20/vehicle as an increase in the vehicle registration fees. That would make a person who has an old beater and drives only very infrequently pay just as much as a person who own a Lincoln Navigator and drives it from New Glarus to Madison everyday to work. Doesn't seem fair to me. Mike "Tell people something they know already and they will thank you for it. Tell them something new and they will hate you for it." -- George Monbiot http://www.captivestate.com ________________________________________________________________ The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand! Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER! Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today! _______________________________________________ Bikies mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.danenet.org/mailman/listinfo/bikies
