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It’s fair and good policy, Kalin says |
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TO THE EDITOR:
During the 2006 campaign, I personally knocked on thousands of doors across Chisago County (10,023 to be exact). I take pride in keeping an open mind, and taking a thoughtful approach about legislation. As a result, I spent my time at people’s doors mostly listening - and rarely making specific promises about supporting or opposing legislation without reading it in detail.
However, I did make one commitment, and that was to vote for a Transportation Funding bill that would provide more state money to fix Chisago County’s roads, and to do so without relying on property taxes. I pledged to do so even if that meant raising the gas tax - because the gas tax is dedicated by the Constitution to only roads and bridges, and because it’s a more fair way to pay for transportation projects.
By voting yes last month I kept my word and followed through on my campaign promise. Any claim otherwise is just not true.
Also not true are grandiose claims of the size of the tax increase, as if it were the “largest tax increase in state history.” The bill averages $660 million of new money each year, some of which is bonding and not from new taxes. Governor Pawlenty’s “fee” increases for the 2006-7 biennium alone amount to $934 million - and that’s without including property tax increases that resulted from state cuts and shifts.
As a fiscal conservative, I know that the Transportation Funding bill will save us all money on our property taxes. The best example of this is the new North Branch bridge. The City has secured funding from Congress, from the County and from their own coffers. Without the new Transportation Bill, the city would have been forced to borrow $4.2 million of property tax dollars for debt service payments, just to start building the bridge before 2012 (MnDOT’s scheduled date for bridge construction).
Because we enacted the Transportation Bill this year, North Branch residents will likely not have to raise their property taxes $4.2 million to pay for the new bridge. Because the state can pay their portion with cash instead of borrowing, no one will have to pay for that debt service. The 2008 Transportation Funding bill saved taxpayers $4.2 million, on just our medium-sized $21 million North Branch Bridge.
Paying for roads and bridges through the gas tax - and not the property tax - is fair and is good policy. That was my position during the campaign, and it’s still my position today.
Jeremy Kalin
State Representative, District 17B (Chisago County)
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