Of the 12 designated special regions considering the tax, only three, composed of 46 counties, voted for it. Those regions were the River Valley, Heart of Georgia and the Central Savannah River, located in the southern and eastern parts of the state. Carroll County, part of the Three Rivers region, voted against the tax by a three-to-one margin. Almost 69 percent of Three Rivers voters cast ballots against it.
One of the stipulations of the referendum was that counties in regions that voted down the act would have to provide a 30 percent match for state road repair funds, while those approving would continue the 10 percent match that was already in place.
One state lawmaker has taken steps to reverse that clause, and Carroll County District 5 Commissioner Kevin Jackson is urging the county commission and voters to get behind the new legislation.
Senate Bill 73 was introduced last week by State Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell, to negate the 30 percent provision of the 2010 Transportation Investment Act that set up the referendum.
“I didn’t support the TSPLOST, and I felt that it was a strong-arm maneuver by the state to get local government to support it and citizens to vote for it,” Jackson said Monday. “It wouldn’t matter how hard they twisted my arm, I couldn’t support a tax increase.”
He said if the state goes through with enforcement of the 30 percent match, it would mean Carroll County would have to pay a $270,000 match for its $900,000 of Department of Transportation road repair funds, instead of $90,000 for a 10 percent match.
“We need to call our state senators and urge them to save us this tremendous amount of dollars,” Jackson said.
“Taxing any one part of Georgia simply because they did not pass a tax increase is un-American,” Albers said. “This is unfortunately the case for 113 counties across the state that voted against the TSPLOST tax.”
Albers said Senate Bill 73 has been assigned to the transportation committee, and he’s already getting a lot of favorable responses from other members of the General Assembly and from constituents.
“I’ve had hundreds of phone calls and thousands of emails in support of the bill,” Albers said Monday afternoon.
The TSPLOST would have funded an $806.1 million list of transportation projects in the 10-county Three Rivers region. Carroll County would have received about $180 million for 35 projects. The 1-cent tax would have been in place for the next 10 years and would have raised the county’s sales tax from 7 to 8 cents per dollar.
Other counties in the Three Rivers region include Butts, Coweta, Heard, Lamar, Meriwether, Pike, Spalding, Troup and Upson.
TSPLOST supporters spent millions of dollars to push the tax, with individuals, such as Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, and organizations, such as the Georgia Chamber of Commerce, backing it. However, the grassroots opposition to it crossed political boundaries from tea parties to the Sierra Club.
Supporters said the additional revenue would help untie the metro Atlanta gridlock, while opponents argued the law that created it was unconstitutional and they were doubtful of the DOT’s ability to follow through on funding. On election day, all north Georgia and metro counties voted against the tax.
In his plan to now strike down the 30 percent penalty, Albers said in a written statement last week, “During these challenging economic times, it is critical that regions across Georgia are given a level playing field when it comes to transportation funding. Penalizing taxpayers for saying ‘no’ to a tax increase sets an erroneous precedent for the future, especially as regions across Georgia, particularly metro Atlanta and the surrounding areas, need long-term transportation investments and improvements.”
Albers, a Roswell business owner and volunteer firefighter, was first elected to the Georgia Senate in 2010 and had not started serving when the 2010 Transportation Investment Act was passed.
If good ol' Kevin would read beyond the simplistic minutae within state law, he'd understand no legislative relief is really needed but "correcting" the evils of last year's highly unpopular T-SPLOST referendum is a great way to grab headlines and look like you're doing something (see elimination of firearms confiscation in County disaster Ordinance as a prime example) even though that "something" is not really needed.
Anyhow, the Gainesville Times has an excellent version of this T-SPLOST story:
Road sales tax penalty to be addressed in Ga. Senate
‘Anti-T-SPLOST’ bill introduced by group of senators
By Jeff Gill
jgill@gainesvilletimes.com
POSTED: February 3, 2013 11:27 p.m.
A thorny issue during last summer’s transportation sales tax debate has found its way to the Georgia legislature during this year’s General Assembly.
A group of senators has introduced the “Anti-T-SPLOST Penalty Act,” which seeks to reduce the matching portion of state Local Maintenance Improvement Grants from 30 percent to 10 percent for local governments in regions of the state that didn’t pass the tax.
The higher match was a criticized part of the unpopular Transportation Investment Act, which called for a July 31 referendum on an additional 1 percent sales tax on transportation. The referendum failed in nine of 12 designated regions across Georgia, including the Georgia Mountains, which included Hall.
State Sen. Steve Gooch, R-Dahlonega, said governments would still have to sink a lot of money in bringing roads up to a certain standard before they are able to get state funding.
“The 30 percent was probably already being spent by local governments before the code section changed,” said Gooch, who served previously as a Georgia Department of Transportation board member and as a Lumpkin County commissioner.
“So, if the bill were to pass, it’s not really going to change anything,” he added. “Local governments are still required by law to fix those problems and those roads before state funds can be used on them.”
As chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, Gooch said he expects the bill first “will be put into a subcommittee, where it will be discussed.”
Still, the provision of TIA has been criticized on principle — that voters shouldn’t be punished for exercising their right to dismiss the sales tax.
“Taxing any one part of Georgia simply because they did not pass a tax increase is un-American,” said Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell, in a news release last week. “This is unfortunately the case for 113 counties across the state that voted against the TSPLOST tax.”
Gainesville Mayor Danny Dunagan mentioned it briefly during the City Council work session on Thursday.
“It’s an extra burden on cities and counties to match at 30 percent, so that (bill) is a good thing.”
Georgia has long had a program where it helps contribute to local road work, particularly resurfacing, with the latest incarnation known as the Local Maintenance Improvement Grant program.
A portion of gas tax receipts helps fund the program, which was streamlined this year to ease the process for cities in getting money. The state had set a Jan. 31 deadline for applications but is continuing to accept a scattered few as they come in, said Todd Long, the DOT’s deputy commissioner.
By the deadline, however, more than “95 percent of the 2013 LMIG allocation (of nearly $110 million) has been requested by local governments,” Long said.
Before LMIG, “local governments always contributed to the program,” he said. “For resurfacing projects, they had to patch and prepare road beds. For new construction ... they had to do engineering, the right-of-way (acquisition) and typically 50 percent of the construction.
“So, their match was probably 70, 80 percent. For most governments, matching 30 percent (now) is probably less than what we required in previous local assistance programs.”
As for local governments, they are already moving forward on plans to get improvements done with LMIG money.
Hall County, for instance, has set aside $2.9 million for road resurfacing over the next few months.
The county is using special purpose local option sales tax revenue, as well as LMIG funds, to prop up its resurfacing efforts.
Nearly 20 miles of roads will be improved, with Bethel Road between Ga. 52 and Ga. 283 its biggest project between now and the expected completion date, April 30.
Feb. 3, 2013 11:29p.m. EST Road sales tax penalty to be addressed in Ga. Senate Jeff Gill Gainesville Times A thorny issue during last summer’s transportation sales tax debate has found its way to the Georgia legislature during this year’s General Assembly.
A group of senators has introduced the “Anti-T-SPLOST Penalty Act,” which seeks to reduce the matching portion of state Local Maintenance Improvement Grants from 30 percent to 10 percent for local governments in regions of the state that didn’t pass the tax.
The higher match was a criticized part of the unpopular Transportation Investment Act, which called for a July 31 referendum on an additional 1 percent sales tax on transportation. The referendum failed in nine of 12 designated regions across Georgia, including the Georgia Mountains, which included Hall.
State Sen. Steve Gooch, R-Dahlonega, said governments would still have to sink a lot of money in bringing roads up to a certain standard before they are able to get state funding.
“The 30 percent was probably already being spent by local governments before the code section changed,” said Gooch, who served previously as a Georgia Department of Transportation board member and as a Lumpkin County commissioner.
“So, if the bill were to pass, it’s not really going to change anything,” he added. “Local governments are still required by law to fix those problems and those roads before state funds can be used on them.”
As chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, Gooch said he expects the bill first “will be put into a subcommittee, where it will be discussed.”
Still, the provision of TIA has been criticized on principle — that voters shouldn’t be punished for exercising their right to dismiss the sales tax.
“Taxing any one part of Georgia simply because they did not pass a tax increase is un-American,” said Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell, in a news release last week. “This is unfortunately the case for 113 counties across the state that voted against the TSPLOST tax.”
Gainesville Mayor Danny Dunagan mentioned it briefly during the City Council work session on Thursday.
“It’s an extra burden on cities and counties to match at 30 percent, so that (bill) is a good thing.”
Georgia has long had a program where it helps contribute to local road work, particularly resurfacing, with the latest incarnation known as the Local Maintenance Improvement Grant program.
A portion of gas tax receipts helps fund the program, which was streamlined this year to ease the process for cities in getting money. The state had set a Jan. 31 deadline for applications but is continuing to accept a scattered few as they come in, said Todd Long, the DOT’s deputy commissioner.
By the deadline, however, more than “95 percent of the 2013 LMIG allocation (of nearly $110 million) has been requested by local governments,” Long said.
Before LMIG, “local governments always contributed to the program,” he said. “For resurfacing projects, they had to patch and prepare road beds. For new construction ... they had to do engineering, the right-of-way (acquisition) and typically 50 percent of the construction.
“So, their match was probably 70, 80 percent. For most governments, matching 30 percent (now) is probably less than what we required in previous local assistance programs.”
As for local governments, they are already moving forward on plans to get improvements done with LMIG money.
Hall County, for instance, has set aside $2.9 million for road resurfacing over the next few months.
The county is using special purpose local option sales tax revenue, as well as LMIG funds, to prop up its resurfacing efforts.
Nearly 20 miles of roads will be improved, with Bethel Road between Ga. 52 and Ga. 283 its biggest project between now and the expected completion date, April 30.
Copyright 2011 MorrisMultimedia . All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed