While Jim flees to the friendlier confines of the Free Republic of Wyoming (rated a B- in the Pew survey), here in A- land, the grandees are immersed in the spitball portion of the budget competition, trading barbs and preaching doom over differences that are generally much smaller than they appear.
But out of this gob-soaked mess arises a proposal from the head Saslaw-crat regarding a way out of the transportation road funding mess:
Saslaw floated the idea of a statewide transportation plan that would allow increases in the gasoline tax, the sales tax on automobiles, and an increase in the tax on real estate sales to raise money to replenish the state’s highway maintenance fund, which is $400 million short of meeting the state’s maintenance needs.
Notice that none of this proposed new money is aimed at easing congestion, setting priorities, reforming VDOT or any of the dozen other items that need to be addressed. Instead, it’s all about the Benjamins…as many of them as he can shovel into the existing system, no questions asked.
Not that the GOP has many bright ideas either. Pressing tax authority for new roads down onto unwilling localities is just another way of passing (someone else’s) buck.
Considering these inputs, it makes me wonder what sort of weird curve Pew used to issue its grades.