OLYMPIA, Wash. – House Democrats in Olympia have killed a proposed tax on exports of fuel from Washington State that left neighboring states fuming.
The 6-cents per gallon tax on fuel refined in Washington and then sent to Oregon, Idaho and Alaska would have helped fund a $16 billion transportation package.
But House transportation chair James Fey says the proposal’s timing was bad.
“We were listening quite intently to the public’s reaction, including the reactions from other states, about the impact it would have,” said Fey. “Particularly at a time when we have increasing fuel costs and potentially even more because of what’s going on in Ukraine.”
They’ll make up for the funding in part by transferring money from the Public Works Assistance Account.
That’s a revolving account that local governments use to finance their projects at low interest rates and Republican representative Mike Steele says it’s the wrong remedy.
“Taking a hundred million dollars from the Public Works trust fund will devastate projects across Washington State,” said Steele.
The rest of the transportation package passed the state House without Republican support on Tuesday, March 1st, and now goes to the Senate.