By James
Kennedy, transportprovidence
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| Poster child for the unfairness of car tax valuations: Charletown Town Council ex-Boss Tom Gentz behind the wheel of one of THREE vintage Porsche convertibles. Assessed tax value: ZERO. Tax paid by Gentz: ZERO. |
I’ve come up with some bargaining chips that I think should be
in the progressive line-up while dealing with the car tax.
Just briefly. . .
Some poor people and lower middle class people struggle mightily
with the car tax, my own household being one of those. However, the car tax is
paid on a per vehicle basis and according to vehicle value.
That means that a household with three new Mercedes has a lot
more to gain from eliminating the car tax than a household with a junker.
A household that doesn’t drive has nothing to gain from
eliminating the car tax at all, and we know that non-driving households are
disproportionately poor.
A better alternative to target low- and middle-income households
would be an expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit.
But it’s unlikely that many legislators will abandon their
promises to get rid of the car tax easily.
I’ve lobbied my own representative, Aaron Regunberg, who I think
is one of the most honorable and thoughtful people in the State House. He
disagrees with me.
So, if we can’t win on the core issue, what are the ways that
progressive legislators could use the car tax fight to get a better deal for
all Rhode Islanders? Here are some of my thoughts.
Reform of Municipal Rates
The state faces a $110 million budget deficit, and the car tax brings in
$215 million in revenue (to put that in perspective, the operating budget of RIPTA for 2017, which includes
money from the state and federal government, as well as fare revenue, is just
over $100 million). Eliminating the car tax would create a giant hole in the
budget.
When state lawmakers eventually wake up to the fiscal
impossibility of eliminating the car tax, they’ll have to think about whether
there are other options on the table.
One attractive option for progressive legislators to push would
be reorganization of the car tax such that the rates are the same from
municipality to municipality.
Block Island has the lowest car tax in the state, at a rate of
$9.75 per $1,000 of Blue Book value, while Providence has the highest rate, at
$60.00 per $1,000.
Rather than eliminate the car tax, legislators could adjust
taxes so that the lowest-paying communities like Block Island pay more, while
the highest-paying communities pay less.
This is closer to the way the car tax used to function, before changes by Gov. Donald Carcieri.
Demand Immigrant Licenses as a
Prerequisite
In addition to eliminating the car tax, the other legislative
priority that Speaker Mattiello has laid out is prevention of undocumented
immigrants from getting drivers’ licenses.
When one scratches one’s head and thinks about it, immigrants
being unable to legally drive in the state is a major blow to the idea that
repealing the car tax will lower the tax burden on the most needy families.
In theory, support for one issue is not tied to the other: one
can believe in both eliminating the car tax, and in immigrant license access.
But when the Speaker’s agenda involves supporting one and
blocking the other, progressive legislators could help gain power for immigrant
communities by demanding concessions around immigrant rights as a prerequisite
for their support on the car tax.
In Providence, 25% of households do not own a car, but
immigrant-heavy neighborhoods like Olneyville are close to 50% car-free.
Progressive legislators have a responsibility to use this bargaining chip to
fight for those families who don’t or can’t drive.
Demand reorganization of RIPTA
Nearly 80% of Rhode Islanders live within a ten minute
walk of a bus stop, according to Grow Smart RI. This might sound like a
good thing– and indeed, that’s how Grow Smart frames it– but in fact it’s a big
part of why only 2.7% of Rhode Islanders use transit regularly, according to
the same information pamphlet.
The only RIPTA service in the state that is on a remotely
frequent schedule is the R-Line, while quote-unquote “frequent” buses like the
1 bus through the Thayer tunnel come only every 18 minutes at peak. That is a
result of a system stretched to its geographic limits.
Transit doesn’t run off of geographic scope, it runs off of
riders.
The far-flung nature of some bus stops means that many core
routes with high ridership potential and even some inner-suburban routes with
moderate ridership potential are being sacrificed to infrequent service in
order to provide coverage service in rural parts of the state.
The Rhode Island GOP has, in fact, sought to increase this trend, arguing that everyone in the state
pays the gas tax, and therefore somehow that stretching the funding of RIPTA
across an even broader coverage area is justified.
EDITOR’S
NOTE: Though I believe in the concept of the greatest good for the greatest
number, I also believe that as a practical matter, people in rural areas should
have access to RIPTA and other public transportation.
Before returning home to
Rhode Island, I worked in Washington, DC for 25 years. DC has transport
problems similar to RI but on a larger scale. To allow suburban residents to
use public transportation, the suburban communities set up their own feeder
system of busses and vans to bring people to the major subway and bus centers.
Towns like Charlestown, with NO link to public transportation, could do a
scaled down, affordable version of this system.
- W. Collette
Simply standing up for a reorganization of RIPTA that puts
greater emphasis on ridership than coverage would be a revolutionary
change for working class families in Rhode Island, because higher frequency in
core areas of the state would mean that taking the bus would be more comparable
to driving in terms of the time it takes to get somewhere.
This would build the reputation of RIPTA as something time-poor people use, rather than leaving it
as a last resort service for time-rich poor people without other options.
It’s hard for people to think of it this way, but if you
eliminate someone’s need for a car, you’ve freed them from the car tax.
Reorganizing RIPTA doesn’t have to cost more money, but there have to be
champions in the legislature that demand that it’s a priority, or else
legislation like Mike Chippendale’s H-5144 will continue to rule
the day.
More RIPTA funding
Of course, while reorganization of RIPTA along lines similar to
Houston’s reorganization could increase ridership without added cost,
legislators could also demand more funding for RIPTA.
In Providence, where the car tax is highest in the state, a
year’s worth of RIPTA fares costs as much as the tax on a $16,000 car (use the
16 from 16,000, subtract 2 to get to 14 for the $2,000 deductible, and then
multiply by 60 to get to $840, which is exactly the same as twelve months of
$70 monthly RIPTA passes).
The “RIPTA tax” of $840 a year is even starker if viewed through
the lens of the town with the lowest car tax: in New Shoreham (the other name
for Block Island), one’s car would have to be worth more than $86,000 before
one paid the same tax rate as RIPTA riders pay in yearly fares. That’s truly
outrageous.
Of the $108 million RIPTA budget, only about $47 million comes
from the Rhode Island budget (the rest is fare revenue and federal funding). To
open up a $215 million hole in a state budget that already has a $110 million
one is irresponsible if we don’t have an equal answer to people paying “RIPTA
tax”.
Legislators need to start powerfully advocating for RIPTA as a
service for middle class people. It’s not merely about the very poor, though
that is something RIPTA can help with.
Creating a RIPTA system that offers competitive travel times,
good frequency and span of service means that someone struggling to pay for two
cars can go down to one car, or a one-car household can go car-free. And that
means significant road savings and congestion improvements, which are
ultimately the thing we’re tasked with improving for drivers.
Seeing the car tax as the best way to improve the lives of
working people in my view is short-sighted.
I hope we can convince progressive
legislators to see it that way, and fight instead for a greater increase of the
Earned Income Tax Credit. But short of that, I hope that legislators at least
use their power to fight for a better bargaining position through this
legislation. It would be a waste to roll over so easily to Mattiello when
legislators have agency to fight for more.
The either/or quandary
None of these issues is inherently either/or. A legislator can
support all of them at once, in theory. But in reality, the budget is a
representation of priorities, and we don’t have the money to do everything
equally.
Speaker Nicolas Mattiello also narrowly won reelection against
his Republican rival, so he needs to keep
his promises on the issues he’s outlined as his top priorities. Progressive legislators
have the ability to use that bargaining weakness on Mattiello’s part to push
harder. Make Mattiello come to the table and give up more, as part of car tax
negotiations.