SCRANTON TIMES TRIBUNE: …If the governor backs away from transportation issues now it means, in effect, that nothing will happen until 2013. Infrastructure work requires spending, which in turn requires revenue. There is scant chance that this version of the Legislature will countenance revenue increases during 2012, a legislative election year….
Mr. Corbett’s commission made some sensible recommendations that the governor, in turn, should bring to the Legislature now. They include applying the oil franchise tax to more than the first $1.25 per gallon of wholesale oil products, the rate that has been in place since 1983. The panel also recommended increasing the driver’s license fee from $29.50 every four years to $69 every eight years, and the vehicle registration fee from $36 annually to $98 every other year. Those fees have not increased since 1997. Combined, the changes would cost motorists about $100 a year, based on driving a car 12,000 miles a year, at 25 miles per gallon.
Some savings and revenue also could be achieved through public-private partnerships for some aspects of transportation, such as highway rest stop operations. And the state also should end redundancy by eliminating the Turnpike Commission and rolling its functions into PennDOT – the state needs just one highway department… (more)
