RICHMOND
A series of expensive penalties for abusive drivers that drew howls of protest from Virginians last year was quietly laid to rest Tuesday in the House of Delegates.
Without a word of debate, the House voted 95-2 to repeal the fees, which subjected Virginians convicted of going 20 mph over the speed limit to a $1,050 penalty.
The Senate Finance Committee today is slated to take up similar bills that would do away with the new fines. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine called for their repeal in his State of the Commonwealth speech earlier this month, saying the penalties had failed to live up to promises that they would improve driving safety and generate $65 million a year for highway maintenance.
Legislators haven’t determined yet how they would be able to replace the expected revenue from the fines.
The General Assembly approved the fines last winter. At Kaine’s insistence, the penalties were applied only to Virginia drivers. The governor said it would be difficult, if not impossible, to collect the fees from out-of-state motorists.
The penalties became an issue in legislative elections last fall and many delegates, after Tuesday’s vote, said they were looking forward to the end of the controversy.
“We should have stopped it last year,” said Del. Lionell Spruill Sr., D-Chesapeake. “It was a bad idea from the start.”
Several other delegates, however, had mixed feelings. They said they voted to kill the fines because some were too high and that their application only to Virginia drivers was unfair.
But they hated to do away with stiff penalties on the worst traffic offenses: a $2,250 fine for drunken driving and a $3,000 assessment for a felony conviction of reckless driving in which someone is maimed or killed.
“I don’t like lowering the fees for drunk drivers,” said Del. David Albo, R-Fairfax, who last year sponsored the abusive-driver legislation.
Albo and several other legislators said they are looking for a way to reinstate the fees against reckless drivers who hurt people and drunken motorists.
The legislature also is seeking a way to replace the revenues that would have come from the abusive-driver penalties. Kaine has urged lawmakers to consider increasing the 3 percent sales tax on cars. Virginia’s sales tax on most other goods is 5 percent.
Senate Majority Leader Richard Saslaw, D-Fairfax, has endorsed increasing the state’s gasoline tax.
House Republican leaders, however, are opposed to any tax increases. The chairman of the House transportation committee – Del. Joe May, R-Loudoun – said he is working on a proposal to increase highway maintenance money but would not discuss its specifics.
Warren Fiske, (804) 697-1565, warren.fiske@pilotonline.com
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Watch The Dot
As stated in another post about traffic
If there are 1.6 million folks in the Hampton Roads area and of that 1.6 million, about 10% are military, where are the other 1.4 million (give or take a few hundred thousand) folks going everyday during the rush hours which last from 5 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. to 7 p.m.? There is no way the military can be blamed for all the traffic ills in this area. It has always come down to poor planning in all the cities for the future (it's evident today there really was none), complete inability to lay out a road system for the region that actually works and moves the people, and a total lack of regional cooperation by all the cities and their leaders. And don't tell someone who is already paying $80 a week for gas that those few extra dollars won't hurt, cause they do.
Gax tax
Yes, but that $2.00 is in addition to the increase of the $20.00 increase to fill up after Katrina and rising market prices. That has broken the bank for a lot of folks. Gasoline and diesel fuel are still $1.50 too high. Besides, most of the traffic congestion is due to Norfolk Naval Base, Norfolk Naval Shipyard, and Newport News shipyard traffic. HRTA would rather spend money to transport tourists between downtown Norfolk, downtown Virginia Beach, and the oceanfront via light rail. Naval base traffic is secondary.
TAX-A-PHOBIA
We Virginians, especially our political leaders, seem to be afflicted with subject disease. Admittedly, I too suffer this affliction to a certain degree. The Virginia tax on gasoline has remained constant for 31 years. An increase is necessary if we are to get ourselves out of constant gridlock. A $.10 per gallon tax increase would add but $2.00 to a 20 gallon fill-up - hardly enough to break anyone's budget, and produce roughly $50 million annually for transportation funding.
Our Governor
"At Kaine’s insistence, the penalties were applied only to Virginia drivers. The governor said it would be difficult, if not impossible, to collect the fees from out-of-state motorists."
Yea, ol' Tim Kaine doesn't want to do what's right so much as he wants to avoid doing what's hard-get the easy money and let the citizens just deal with it. Nice to see our GA finally did something that the PEOPLE demanded they do for a change.
Why not raise the gasoline tax, you ask?
Because politicians are always thinking about the next election. None of them wants to be associated with a "tax" of any kind. That's because we, their constituency, are so against any tax - even when it's for our own good. I guarantee, any pol that supports an increase of the gasoline tax, will hear about it again leading up to November. So, we're in a perpetual state of limbo! It's easy to say "reappropriate" and recommend other nonviable solutions. Fact is, the money has to come from somewhere. I'm not for the abusive driver fees. It was a stupid solution from the start. I'm not for an increase in the gas tax either!!! I'm content to just sit in traffic - and when moving, drive deteriorated roads! In other words, I have no solution, either.
Why so much resistance to just raising the gas tax?
Maybe I'm a little slow on the uptake this morning, but it still baffles me as to why the General Assembley is so hesitant to raise the motor vehicle fuel tax to fund highway improvements. Let's see. Vehicles that use the highways need fuel. Fuel taxes are non-discriminatory - they don't care who you are, everyone that pumps has to pay. Granted, fuel prices are high, but it seems we've all managed to adjust, as I don't see a discernable reduction of vehicles on the roads. Anyone that has lived in this area for any time knows the interstates are in dire need of repair or upgrade. It can't be that difficult to figure out, can it? OK, given the other bills recently proposed by our elected officials, maybe it can.......
NEW Appoach
Make the governor return the money back to the transportation budget and quit misappropiating these funds and there will be no need to find a way to replace these funds. Richmond needs to stop with all the entitlement programs only Washington seems to be worse at spending money they don't have and then calling on tax increases to pay for this debotchery.