H.P. TAX IN TEXAS

[farmer tx]

I just got through reading the evening rag.
Saw where the Texas lawmakers are trying to
legislate a fee (TAX) on all recreational
vehicles ie: boats,motorcycles,cars,offroad.
This fee (Tax) will be assesed for air pollution
control programs on any vehicle with over 50hp.
They call it an "environmental impact fee(TAX).
Just wondering what other state or states they
got THIS idea from. Does anyone pay such a fee
(TAX) anywhere.
Thanks

[Donzi Blackhawk]

These jerks need to keep their damn hands OUT of our pockets! If they could stop wasting money on pathetic programs, they would not need to keep dreaming up ways to rob us blind!

Take them out back and give them a good beating!

Bryant

[Greg K]

In Florida, marinas and storage facilities charge and collect "environmental impact fees".
I don't know of anywhere else that has a fee you are describing.

[Sam]

Here in Mich the tax that we pay on fuel helps pay for such things but there is a second form of funding. On all baots 26' and larger require a $26.00 "User Fee" label. Once you pay this you have to put a this ugly sticker on your boat to prove to the water cops who ever they might be that you have payed. From what I have seen only about 25% of boaters pay this fee.

Sam

[Rootsy]

for 39 cents on the gallon tax in michigan you'd think we could at least patch some of the potholes.... :rolleyes:

[roadtrip se]

Mark,

Frontier justice comes to mind as a first step for whatever nimrod in Austin is thinking of doing this to us. Heck, we don't have a state income tax, what makes them think we would sit still for this sort of bs.

Could you post a bill number for the proposed legislation? Then we can get on the texas.gov site and find out what this animal really is. Sometimes, it's the reporter that has an issue and not the government.

My idea would be to then throw up a detailed post on some of the other boat and recreational vehicle boards and get an old-fashioned grass roots letter and phone campaign going.

Nimrods tried a mandatory pfd law a year or so ago and it died in committee, due to the uproar response. We can make the same thing happen with this piece of fine thinking.

Drop me a line this weekend!

Todd

"Honest Mr. Taxman, that decal says 50, not 500HP"

[farmer tx]

Todd,
This is all I know for now.
"Rep. Warren Chisum of Pampa, the House Environmental Regulation Committee chairman, said he will file legislation that would require
an environmental impact permit sticker on vehicles with a 50-hp. engine or larger."
"He said he hoped the fee (TAX) would raise
$188 million annually through the year 2007."
Lawmakers are under pressure to come up with funding, which is needed to help bring the Houston and Dallas regions into compliance with federal clean air laws.
The plan must meet Environmental Protection
Agency approval.
"Under Chisum's proposal, which he hopes would
be tackled and signed into law early in the legislative session, a permit would be obtined at the same time people pick up their lisences or
go for inspections."
Anyone not having the permit could be fined $100
under his plan.


Just wondering if you remember the fiasco last year when they proposed raising the out of state
registration fee from $1.00 to $225.00.
That piece of legislative brainstorm was deemed
unconstitutional.
This one is talking $5.-$7. each so it kind of scares me. They probably think it will slide by.
At $5. they would have to asses 37.500.000 vehicles, at $7. they would asses 26.850.000 vehicles.
I can't remember if boats have a 3 or 4 year
reg. cert. but could increase cost by 25%.
I'll try to find a bill #.
Later,

[oldLenny]

...but since the US has bailed on "KYOTO" and the initial principle, designed in house...(eg: clean air worldwide and as well ,his election platform...) why would this dude even have a case or support in the house...when challenged...?

Oh...and about the clean air platform...nevermind... :rolleyes:

[AVickers]

The purpose of the "fee" (TAX) is to raise money while at the same time preserving the political status quo -- NOT to clean up the environment.

(It's the same thing as the new tobacco and alcohol taxes -- sin taxes -- in that it levies a tax on things that are either deemed sinful or politically incorrect; or levies taxes against groups that are too fragmented or disenfranchised to fight it; or against groups that are too busy making a living and paying their own bills and other taxes and staying out of trouble to organize and fight it...) The ratbastard who came up with it is some kind of politico hack genius!

Pampa, Texas, by the way, is in the middle of freekin' nowhere! No boats of over 50 hp could find water and no RVs there 'cause the poor sodbusters who live there can't afford 'em. Almost all the vehicles in the area are registered as Farm Trucks -- and there's probably an exemption to the tax on them. (Also, interestingly enough, I sat next to this goober and a representative from the Dallas Area on a plane about two years ago and they were planning legislation that would place a huge coal/oil/ng-burning power plant in the Pampa area to provide power in the DFW area so that the energy to run all them newfangled electric cars in Dallas/Ft. Worth wouldn't soil the air in Dallas and work against them meeting federally mandated clean air standards... Wonder what all them panhandle sodbusters would think about having rich Dallas folks' electrical energy consumption and lifestyles polluting their little world? Talk about politics making strange bedfellows...)

The other thing it's supposed to do is convince the federales (another whole group of folks w/ their heads up their arses) that Texas is making a "good faith" effort to clean up the air in the counties surrounding Dallas/Ft. Worth, Houston, San Antonio, and maybe Austin and El Paso. This so that the feds won't jerk highway / transportation funds -- which, by the way, are raised via more taxes on our own gasoline and diesel fuels. What a crock of SH******T!

As for cleaning up the air or water, I can't see any of the funds raised doing anything in that regard... It's an offset (new TAX) 'cause the economy has busted other tax-raising schemes (like business and franchise taxes) and the state can't bear to cut out any of its own programs or bureauracracy (Because many of the cuts would affect lots of lower-income (read poor, out-of-work, never worked, on-the-dole, etc.) or totally liberalized voters -- who wouldn't, couldn't or don't have boats, RVs or multiple vehicles -- and who tend to vote in blocks around "poor me..." or "hug a tree..." issues (If you get my drift...).).

At least in Connecticut, they've had the balls to start cutting programs and people. We'll see how that turns out...

It's also interesting that the under 50hp rule for boats exempts all the sail boaters -- a group who, by the way, has been working to ban power boats from many lakes, including Lake Travis, here in the Austin area...

This guy from Pampa has aligned inner-city folks, rural sodbusters, tree-hugging liberals, sailboaters and, maybe, rowboaters, canoers and kayakers into a single block who would either actively support his agenda or not oppose it. And his legislative District isn't affected in the least -- so he doesn't have to suffer through a bunch of pissed off constituents. (...except for that power plant that may, in the short term, provide jobs for all the folks in the Panhandle who aren't getting paid any more to NOT raise cotton, corn, sorgum, soybeans and whatever else that was being funded under the old Farm Bill.) Furthermore, NOT A ONE of us would get rid of our boat, car or RV to save the $5 to $10 that's going to be levied against us.

Again, the ratbastard is a political genius...

[HyperDonzi]

Heres a good one. If all the smog control devices decrease power out put, whats the point? It means you need to run more RPM to go the same speed. which more RPM=more gas consumption.

[Darrell]

I don't understand why motors under 50hp should not be included. I'll bet my 502 does not create
as much pollution as a 40ph two-stroke motor would. Of course I don't think any of them should be taxed (you guys have pay reg. fees like we do in Oklahoma.)

Darrell

[Barry Phillips]

I wish these jerkXXX lawmakers where as clever spending our money as they are takeing from us. NJ should change it's name from the Garden State to the Bend Over State. Our fearless new govenor thinks letting insurance companies charge anything they what will keep them from leaving the state when in fact it's over stupid non-fault laws that have never worked. Now I'm reading that the Feds want to rpeal morgage detuctions on income tax, that should push the economy over the edge totally.

SO-SLO