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Leaders say they won't give blanket support to the county's 3-cent per gallon gasoline tax increase unless there is a better split of the proceeds.
By CHASE SQUIRES, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published May 4, 2002
SAN ANTONIO -- If Pasco County commissioners want to raise the countywide gasoline tax, they might have to do it without the support of the county's six municipalities.
Unhappy with the formula used to distribute collected gas taxes, leaders from the municipalities said they would like to support the proposed tax increase but cannot without changes.
"There's a lack of fair sharing; there's a lack of revenue, and the cities are getting further and further and further behind," Port Richey Mayor Eloise Taylor said.
Debate at the quarterly Municipal Association of Pasco meeting began Thursday night when New Port Richey council member Tom Finn urged fellow city leaders to support a proposed 3-cent per gallon gas tax increase. There might be problems with the distribution, he argued, but if the cities don't back the proposal now, swing vote Commissioner Pat Mulieri might not agree to the increase.
Some new revenue is better than none, he argued.
San Antonio Mayor Roy Pierce led the charge against a blanket blessing.
"They'll use the same unfair formula that's used right now," Pierce said.
Pierce said the formula used to distribute existing gas taxes favors the county. Cities, he said, get shortchanged. Until that formula is adjusted, Pierce said, the cities should hold off on supporting an additional tax.
"Everything they get in the gas taxes should be shared equally with the cities," Pierce said.
County budget chief Mike Nurrenbrock said cities get a cut of the current gas money based on the number of road miles they maintain, plus 10 percent of that total.
He said if the county raises gas taxes by 1 cent, commonly referred to in state jargon as "the ninth cent," those proceeds do not have to be shared with the cities. If the additional 2 cents were approved, some would go to cities based on interlocal agreements. State law says only that it should be based on what cities spend on transportation, Nurrenbrock said.
He added that Pierce objected some years ago to the formula for distribution of gas tax money and proposed his own. However, county officials did the math and found that the county formula actually was more generous to San Antonio than Pierce's.
With more than 20 city leaders in the room Friday, only Finn was willing to back a 3-cent gas tax increase in its current form.
If a better formula is devised, others said, they would support the increase, but only if it were fair to cities.
The County Commission couldn't agree on the tax increase proposal at a meeting last month. Four of the five commissioners must support the increase for it to pass. Some want a 3-cent increase; some want a 1-cent boost.
Finn said an agreement must be reached soon for it to take effect this year.
The municipal association did express interest in seeking a better solution to growth proposed by community activist and former legislative candidate Larry McLaughlin.
McLaughlin asked for, and got, the association's support in his effort to have county commissioners study the concept of Urban Service Areas when the county updates its land use plan.
With Urban Service Areas, growth would be clustered in designated areas close to existing infrastructure, instead of allowing huge subdivisions to pop up in rural areas, forcing the county to run roads and water and sewer lines to remote locations.
The concept would protect the environment and save money, McLaughlin said.
Municipal association members agreed to send a resolution of support for the Urban Service Areas study to the County Commission.