LANSING – A bill discussed Wednesday at the Michigan House Transportation Committee would change the current distribution of sales tax revenue to give more money to infrastructure in Michigan.
HB 4521 would direct that 4 percent of the sales tax allocated on gasoline that now goes to the general fund would be split between the State Trunkline Fund and county road commissions, said Rep. David Agema (R-Grandville).
How much that would mean in additional funding would depend on the price of fuel. If the current roughly $4 a gallon for gasoline continued, it would raise as much as $112 million for those funds, officials said, but the bills require that at least $70 million go for the funding.
“We want to take a small percentage that isn’t delegated to schools or other things and put it toward the roads,” Agema said.
James Walker with the National Motorists Association said although it is not politically possible, he would like to see 100 percent of the taxes going to infrastructure.
Rep. David Nathan (D-Detroit) said the bill sounded like it was hurting schools to help roads.
“If we’re going to take money from 4 percent then we should give it to Detroit, so they don’t have to face a revenue sharing cut,” he said. “We should give it to schools so they don’t have to have a $100 per pupil cut.”
Agema said the proposal would give stable, constant revenue to infrastructure without raising taxes.
Rep. Paul Opsommer (R-DeWitt), the committee chair, said the bill will not be voted on just yet, however, the committee did approve a substitute that would give half of the money to the State Trunk Line and half of the money to county road commissions if the bill were passed.
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