Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, April 22, 1991 TAG: 9104220096
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
And retired lawyer Urchie B. Ellis of Richmond says he will continue to push for legislative changes that would force truckers to pay more. He knows it won't be easy.
"The trucking industry is probably one of the two or three most powerful lobbies in the state," he said. "They're heavy spenders, and they have some clout."
The industry used that clout in the 1991 General Assembly session to kill a bill increasing truckers' highway user fees and taxes by $53 million.
According to the VDOT study, each passenger vehicle pays 6.2 percent more than it should for highway construction, repair and maintenance. Each light truck and bus pays 35.6 percent less than its share, and each larger truck falls short by 21.8 percent.
Based on a $1.5 billion highway program, overall passenger vehicles overpay by a total of $66 million. All other vehicles underpay: two-axle, six-tire trucks by $18 million, single-unit trucks with three or more axles by $10 million, and tractor-trailers by $17.5 million.
Ellis said he believes the study understates the amount motorists are overpaying because there was no analysis of several funding sources, including toll revenues, the half-cent sales tax that goes to the Transportation Trust Fund, and real estate recordation taxes that were used for the U.S. 58 project in Southside Virginia.
Also, the gap between what truckers and other highway users pay is widening. A similar VDOT study in 1981 showed each passenger vehicle was overpaying by 4.2 percent.
The latest study attributed the growing disparity to changes in the transportation system and the volume and mix of traffic. Since 1981, annual vehicle miles traveled nationwide have increased 50 percent, and 2,200 miles of roads and 743 new bridges have been built. Meanwhile, the tax on a gallon of gasoline has gone up from 9 cents to 17.7 cents, and several other highway-related taxes and fees have increased.
Norman Grimm, manager of traffic safety for AAA Potomac, said equalizing the highway cost burden will be one of the organization's major goals in the next legislative session.
"I think something can be done," he said. "We have to get the public somewhat incensed about it. Then it's a matter of the public applying pressure on their legislators."
Julie Lapham, director of Common Cause of Virginia, said the consumer group is interested in the issue but has not taken a position.
"I'm not sure where legislators come down on what the fair share is" for truckers, Lapham said.
Ellis, the former general counsel for Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac Railroad, said he has no doubt the truckers "are grossly underpaying." He said he has undertaken the mission of lobbying for reform because his background in transportation law makes him one of the few members of the general public who understand the issues.
"The general public never gets adequately represented because you have to either be an expert or hire one," Ellis said. "I'm just doing some pro bono work for John Q. Public. I'll try to keep the pot boiling."
Ellis said he sees no chance of actually lowering motorists' expenses. But he said making truckers pay more might forestall future increases on other highway users.
P. Dale Bennett, executive vice president of the Virginia Trucking Association, said the public is going to pay one way or another.
"Everything we get in our economy is moved by truck," Bennett said. "The more it costs to move the product, the more it costs the consumer."
He added that increasing taxes paid by truckers also could damage the state's business climate.
"When someone is looking for a place to locate a manufacturing plant, one of the things they look at is the cost of moving the product," Bennett said. "We've got to stay competitive."
According to Bennett, the bill that was killed by the Senate Transportation Committee would have raised Virginia's tax burden on truckers from 18th in the nation to 13th.
Grimm said he is not persuaded by those arguments.
"It's more a scare thing than anything else," he said. "I don't think tax equity is something that's going to drive businesses out of Virginia."
by CNB