After Michigan’s Gas Tax and Fee Increase ‘We Don’t Have The Money To Build It Right’
When will this every end! We were told back in 2015 that all they needed was an extra $1.2 billion dollars a year of our money and the state can fix our roads.
Well apparently according to Michigan's Depart of Transportation Director, Paul Ajegba:
We don't have the money to build it right
The Detroit Free Press is reporting that uplifting message. Director Ajegba was scheduled to appear before a Senate committee Wednesday and tell them that he needs more of our tax dollars or fees. He did not meet with the committee since Governor Whitmer shut down the state government yesterday and now today.
Apparently Governor Snyder told the legislature that MDOT alone needed an extra $1.2 billion a year to fix roads. The $1.2 billion a year included in the 2015 tax package that passed will eventually raise is split between MDOT and local governments under a formula set out in Public Act 51 of 1951, which they say means that MDOT only gets 395 of the $1.2 billion.
Did you know that Tax Foundation states that Michigan's taxes on fuel are ranked sixth-highest in the nation and our roads are frequently ranked among the nation's worst.
One reason according to the Detroit Free Press article is:
Michigan is one of only a handful of states that applies its full sales tax — 6 percent in Michigan — to fuel sales, but does not direct those sales tax revenues to road repairs
Let us look at the state of Ohio, why Ohio because it has very similar weather as the state of Michigan. Ohio's has the 29th-highest fuel taxes in the United States and if you look at a 2015 study, which was based on United States Census numbers, you will find that Ohio spent $510 per capita on highways, compared with $368 per capita spent in Michigan, $410 in Indiana, and $745 in Illinois.
All that being said it sounds to me that the state is going to be going after our pocketbooks again.
Watch your back pockets and purses my fellow Michiganders.
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