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White House remains reluctant to increase fuel taxes

A six-year surface transportation bill is going to come with a lofty price tag no matter how the bread is sliced. The sticking point remains how to fund it, especially with White House officials saying they’re reluctant to raise fuel taxes.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has been making the rounds this week attending a trio of Senate committee hearings to discuss President Obama’s $129 billion transportation budget for 2012 as part of a six-year, $550 billion reauthorization bill.

The message remains clear from the White House: Avoid raising fuel taxes in times of uncertainty and a high unemployment rate.

“The president has said very clearly through me and others that he is not in favor of raising the gas tax when unemployment is at 8.9 percent and we still have a lousy economy,” LaHood said.

“There are some people in this country that can little afford to buy a gallon of gasoline, let alone one that’s been increased by an increase in the gas tax.”

The administration is not opposed to using tolls to pay for projects that add capacity to the network. So far, the administration is opposed to tolls on existing interstate highways except in previously approved pilot programs.

Congressional Democrats, including Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia, said they support the president’s six-year plan. Many Republicans, on the other hand, in both the House and Senate are not keen on the spending levels as proposed and say the DOT should run leaner.

“This proposal sounds less like a budget and more like a transportation wish list,” Sen. John Thune, R-SD, said during a Senate Commerce hearing Tuesday, March 8.

LaHood made a stop at the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on Wednesday, and the topic again was funding and using DOT grants and private investment to get the most out of federal dollars. LaHood was scheduled to appear Thursday before the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development.

“We need to work with Congress on what will become a jobs bill,” LaHood told the EPW Committee.

When a new surface transportation bill materializes, highway users stand to pay significantly higher taxes and fees to travel, whether it’s with a fuel tax, user fees, grants, tolling or some combination of those.

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