Wrong Turns on the California Roads

What a surprise! Unions of engineers and laborers who rely on taxpayer dollars want higher taxes and fees to "fix the roads" in California, and the Leftist Democrats who literally control the state like the idea of higher fees on automobiles and higher taxes on gasoline and diesel.

Mind you, the fuel is already taxed to build and maintain the roads, but the fund has been raided by politicians and what's left has often been spent on underused transit projects.

Over and over and over again, Californians have been taxed with promises of "fixing" one thing, only to have the money go elsewhere.

Not this time, say the Democrats, like Lucy offering Charlie Brown a chance to kick the football.

They claim that the law they just adopted will amend the state constitution to ensure these new taxes and fees will go to the roads. Ah, but 1) they sneak in "and transit"; 2) even if they stick to this, they'll simply redirect the existing taxes and fees away; 3) there's always a loophole that allows the money to be redirected.

To add to the nefarious nature of this, the increase is tied to inflation, so that means the pain for the taxpayers will never ease, and since raising fuel taxes causes inflation, it's a vicious cycle. Gas taxes go up, inflation goes up as a result (because just about every good and service we use has transportation costs), and so gas taxes go up again.

This is what happens when your state is completely controlled by Democrats. Every statewide office is held by a Democrat and the Democrats have enough of the needlessly bicameral legislature that they can do whatever they want. And they do. So as the socialists, unionists, and reconquistadors who control Los Angeles and San Fransisco run Sacramento, everyone else in the state has to bend over and take it.

People who think this is going to fix the roads they drive are going to be very disappointed, if they bother to pay attention. If the money IS spend on "roads and transit", much of it will go to "transit", meaning walkways, bike paths, rail lines, bus stops, etc.


Considering public employee pensions have massive unfunded liabilities (which means they have promised payouts they don't have the money to cover), tax increases are probably going to be shifted to that. We're going to be paying for government employees who're retired (and thus are no longer providing us with a service) to live better than we do.

If these taxes force people out of their automobiles, the Democrats consider that a win. They want all of us "little people" living in communal structures and taking "public transit" everywhere, because then it is easier to control our behavior and they think it is better for their god, Nature.

Jon Coupal of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association wrote something about this that was carried by the Orange County Register.

The $5.2 billion in taxes imposed annually are aimed squarely at the middle class — citizens who see their cars not as a luxury but as a necessity to get to work, take the kids to school and run their errands at the end of a long day.

Too bad! We're supposed to simply suffer.

The governor and his tax-and-spend allies — including interests that get rich off the taxpayer dime — are pushing a gas tax hike of 12 cents per gallon on top of our already high gas tax plus higher vehicle registration fees that average out to about $50 per vehicle. This would leave California with the highest gas and car taxes in the nation by far.

Again, that additional 12 cents is to start. It will go up with inflation. Also, keep in mind Californians also have a wide variety of fees and taxes, including:

property taxes and assessments
state income taxes, plus an additional tax on millionaires
sales taxes (it's going to be about 10% in some places)
utility taxes
"sin" taxes

Not surprisingly, taxpayers are not buying what the governor is selling. A Public Policy Institute of California poll shows that a majority of Californians, including 42 percent of Democrats, oppose the taxes. A recent California Chamber of Commerce poll showed that 80 percent of voters want to see spending reforms first, before new taxes.

Sure, but they keep voting in the tax increasers.

There is a good reason for the lack of trust between the people and their government when it comes to transportation spending. General fund spending has increased by $36 billion over the last six years, and not one dime has been spent on transportation infrastructure. If legislators don’t view transportation as a critical priority, why should California drivers support even higher taxes?

What happens is that the legislators fund their pet project and programs, figuring they can get the low information voters to support additional taxes for critical core services like roads and prisons.

No one doubts that California’s roads and highways are in terrible shape. But the blame for this rests squarely on our political class, not hard-working taxpayers who already live in a state that has the highest income tax rate in America as well as the highest state sales tax.

But of course we have to pay more!

The question has always been one of priorities. How is it that the state budget is near record highs and yet no money can be found for transportation?

We know the answer to that.

Over the years, billions of dollars of truck weight fees have been diverted from road repair to pay off bond debt which, for all other state bonds, are repaid out of the general fund, not out of revenue that is supposed to be dedicated to transportation.

And no discussion of transportation spending would be complete without addressing the nation’s biggest boondoggle: high-speed rail. Hundreds of millions of dollars of cap-and-trade money every year are going to prop up this floundering project that could be better spent on transportation systems people actually use. And a further $3 billion in sales taxes on the purchase of new and used vehicles annually could be used to fund road repair.

It's so frustrating.

A great state is being ruined by corrupt, misguided, and intrusive politicians.