Alaska\u2019s gasoline taxes could triple by 2018 under a plan proposed by Gov. Bill Walker on Thursday.<\/p>\n
The gas tax hike was included as part of Walker\u2019s budget plan and follows a similar idea that the Alaska Legislature failed to vote upon last session.<\/p>\n
Alaska has the lowest motor fuel taxes in the nation, but lawmakers have been reluctant to approve tax increases of any kind. Last session, the only notable revenue increase was a hike in hunting and fishing fees.<\/p>\n
Walker\u2019s fuel tax proposal calls for increasing the gasoline tax from 8 cents per gallon to 16 cents per gallon on July 1, 2017. On July 1, 2018, the tax would rise to 24 cents per gallon.<\/p>\n
Taxes on boat fuel, aviation gas and jet fuel would also rise accordingly.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t feel like it makes us uncompetitive or is an onerous tax; it just makes us average,\u201d said Alaska Revenue Commissioner Randall Hoffbeck on Friday by phone.<\/p>\n
Alaska would still have below-average gasoline taxes, according to the federal U.S. Energy Information Administration. As of July 1, 2016, the national average for state gasoline taxes was 26.6 cents. Pennsylvania has the highest state taxes at 51.4 cents per gallon.<\/p>\n
If Walker\u2019s plan is implemented, an average driver (13,476 miles at 22.5 miles per gallon) would pay $95.83 more per year in state fuel taxes.<\/p>\n
That would raise an extra $81 million per year, according to estimates from the Alaska Department of Revenue. Alaska\u2019s budget deficit would be $2.78 billion if the Legislature approves Walker\u2019s proposed budget cuts but doesn\u2019t enact any new revenue. In addition to the gasoline tax hike, Walker has proposed using a portion of Permanent Fund earnings for state services.<\/p>\n
Last year, Walker proposed to simply double the gasoline tax. House Bill 249 never advanced from the House Transportation Committee, and when the bill was revived in each of the Legislature\u2019s special sessions, it never received a vote of the full House.<\/p>\n
Walker will introduce versions of the tax increase in both the House and the Senate.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe brought it back mostly because it makes a lot of sense,\u201d Hoffbeck said, but also because the gas tax hike \u2014 unlike others proposed by the governor last year \u2014 got a little bit of support.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis one had the most traction last year; this one looked like it might move last year but ultimately didn\u2019t,\u201d Hoffbeck said.<\/p>\n
One of the concerns raised during Legislative debate last year was that the new tax revenue would simply go into the state\u2019s general fund. Gas tax revenue currently can end up paying for unrelated things like schools or health care.<\/p>\n
In this year\u2019s proposal, Walker would create a \u201ctransporation maintenance fund\u201d to collect gas-tax proceeds.<\/p>\n
That fund would be used for \u201cdirect capital, operating, or maintenance costs of highways and highway infrastructure,\u201d including the Alaska Marine Highway. Boat fuel taxes would go into a subaccount reserved for port projects, and aviation fuel taxes would be reserved for airport projects.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy designating those funds, we hope to give people a little more comfort,\u201d Hoffbeck said.<\/p>\n
The new proposal affects aviation fuel taxes slightly different than last year\u2019s proposal did. Last year\u2019s bill incorporated recommendations from a state aviation advisory panel to increase taxes more on jet fuel than aviation gas, which is used in smaller aircraft. That led to opposition from major airlines, including Delta and Alaska, as well as a national air cargo lobbying organization.<\/p>\n
This year\u2019s bill simply doubles, then triples existing aviation fuel taxes.<\/p>\n
Last year, Rep. Les Gara, D-Anchorage, successfully amended Walker\u2019s gas-tax hike to include triggers based on the price of North Slope crude. If crude prices were high and the state was earning more oil revenue, the gas tax would fall.<\/p>\n
Walker\u2019s new proposal doesn\u2019t include those triggers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe would like to see these taxes permanent,\u201d Hoffbeck said, explaining that if Gara\u2019s triggers were implemented, the state might not know how much money it would earn in a given year.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf somebody proposes a trigger and that\u2019s the only way to get it passed, we\u2019ll deal with it,\u201d Hoffbeck said. \u201cWe see it as a lot cleaner to make the tax rate change permanent.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2022 Contact reporter James Brooks at 523-2258 or james.k.brooks@juneauempire.com.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Clarification:<\/strong> Initial documents supplied by the governor’s office indicated the tax bill would be submitted first to the Senate. A Walker spokesperson clarified Monday that the bill will appear in both bodies of the Legislature simultaneously.<\/em><\/p>\n Correction:<\/strong> If Walker’s plan was implemented, an average would pay $95.83 more per year in state fuel taxes. A previous version of this story calculated the additional cost as more than $130.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Alaska\u2019s gasoline taxes could triple by 2018 under a plan proposed by Gov. Bill Walker on Thursday. The gas tax hike was included as part of Walker\u2019s budget plan and follows a similar idea that the Alaska Legislature failed to vote upon last session. Alaska has the lowest motor fuel taxes in the nation, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":426,"featured_media":26922,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-26921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/426"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26921"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=26921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}