This fall, voters in parts of King, Pierce, and Snohomish counties will vote on the largest transportation package in state history. The measure funds both Sound Transit’s Phase Two and RTID, or Regional Transportation Investment District, and it’s roads improvement package. The taxes involved are diverse. They include MVET, sales taxes, a license fee, tolls, and an optional local gas tax. See the update below, folks.
Though no one likes taxes, these tax increases are small and don’t fall disproportionately on any one group. Unlike the tragically flawed Seattle Monorail Project, people who own cars will not alone bear the burden of funding our transportation investments. During the monorail years, people who owned cars but rarely drove were nailed with big motor vehicle excise taxes. Talk about resentment! Thankfully, the ST2/RTID package won’t be funded on one tax. Now, angst-ridden, car-less, Capitol Hill emo kids will be able to fund transportation improvements.
Every Morrissey record, every jar of pomade, and every half rack of PBR will make a difference.
UPDATE:
I received an update from Julia Patterson’s office:
It looks like you are referencing an old RTID web page in your recent post on the taxes used to finance the Roads and Transit Plan. It does not reflect the proposed projects or taxes included in the Roads and Transit plan that will be before voters this November.
The most up to date website is www.rtid.org and www.roadsandtransit.org.
The tax sources proposed to finance the Roads and Transit plan are a .8% MVET and a .6% sales tax increase. There is no license fee included in the plan, nor a local option gas tax. You will also notice a number of Seattle road projects in the current plan, that are not reflected in the 2004 plan that is discussed on the old web page.
Pardon my goof, folks.
Brian Emo? Wasn’t he a record producer?
Ignore that! I’m “under pressure”!
I get to blame sprawl caused by the cross-base highway on Emo kids from Seattle? Yes!!!
http://www.taxpayer.net/TCS/Ro.....basewa.htm
http://www.tahomaaudubon.org/crossbasehighway/
http://www.conservationnw.org/...../crossbase
http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.....asp?source
Hate to tell you this, Will, but the RTID car tax isn’t that much less than the Monorail tax. But what I really want to know is — are these taxes ENOUGH to finish all these projects, or are they just a down payment … and will we get hit up again for more, later?
Wow! And when I say WOW! I mean…how fucking dumb are you?
I don’t know whether this qualifies you as a hick, hayseed, or yokel…but did you glance at the specifics of this plan and see that Seattle….gets absolutely fucking nothing?
They promised us light rail to Northgate last time we voted it in.
They have been planning on replacing AWV for at least twenty years. Twenty years of excise tax on gas. Twenty years on road taxes. The citizens of Seattle have paid and paid and paid. And last time I looked out my door, Ballard is still a shithole of unpaved roadways.
But I’m sure we will get more bicycle right of way. After all, how much does paint cost?
Do you know why they are pushing this vote now? Because when light rail starts, and people find out it will take longer to go to the airport on the tram then on a bus(and let us not forget all the stops in the Rainier Valley) they might have an epiphany about the level of genius at Sound Transit.
Will, the politicians in Seattle are exactly like the girls at Rick’s. They promise everything, and delivery nothing. And your wallet just gets lighter and lighter. And if you have a problem with that, there will be a council member from Sumner,Lakewood, Bellevue, or Everett(look it up) who is on the Sound Transit board that you can complain to.
Oh yeah, who is the directly elected official in charge of Sound Transit? Answer: there isn’t one. Which, and I know this is a quaint notion, is unconstitutional. It violates the one man, one vote test. Nobody in, say, Shoreline or Burien has an equal say through an elected representative that someone in Sumner does. Which is why Metro Transit is now King County Metro. Don’t believe me, that was U.S. Federal Judge Dwyer’s(the elder) ruling.
I would love to pay taxes if they were going to benefit me or Seattle in general. But the whole system is set up to benefit people in King County outside of Seattle. Seventy percent of ALL new service is mandated by the council to be given outside of the city. Eighty percent of all the ridership is in the city, but seventy percent of all new service goes outside of the city. And you want to trust those geniuses with more money? Think about that next time you are in a crush of people on the 15 or 18.
For example, I have an old pickup I use for hauling yard waste once a year. Think I want to pay $100 for tabs for it? Guess again.
This tax package spreads the transportation costs around TOO much, and isn’t heavy enough on user fees. Why should retirees on fixed incomes struggling to pay health costs and even buy food in face of inflation have to subsidize commuters? I’m a “no” vote on this package.
What we need in my neck of the woods (Pierce County) is to stop building new roads, fix up the roads we have, build infill housing and run more express buses. The road budget is going to kill us.
Despite having a growth management law for over a decade Pierce County still has little, if any, control over sprawl and very little infill housing is being built. I’m voting no on anything that helps to increase housing in the hinterlands.
“these tax increases are small ”
You have got to be kidding….
$18,333 per man woman and child in this taxing area.
small, I’d really hate to see big
I’m a Hell no on this one.
“these tax increases are small ”
If you drive 70’s Pinto fastback
“these tax increases are small ”
If you ride a schwinn you had left to you in a will
“these tax increases are small ”
If you walk to work in Sam’s club Shoes
“these tax increases are small ”
If your 10 yr old hybrid runs on “Cream Corn”
“these tax increases are small ”
If you’re a member of Goldy’s cuckoo club
“these tax increases are small ”
If you’re ride to work each day has your knees up around your elbows
“these tax increases are small ”
If you can mow your lawn with your dad’s old handheld edgeclippers
“these tax increases are small ”
If you’re invitation to Roger Rabbit’s retirement party just arrived in your mailbox
“these tax increases are small ”
If your wallet has not been picked enough by this state.
Based on the financial modeling, the burden of tax as a percentage of income falls five times as hard on the lowest income bracket as on the top 1%.
Wow…the Democrats are so different than the Republicans, because they protect the poor by taxing them FIVE TIMES AS MUCH AS THE RICH under this proposal.
I wonder why I left the Democratic party, then I see this and know that really….they left me.
Thanks for the link, Will.
I’M LEANING TOWARDS A NO VOTE ON THIS TOO UNTIL THE DEMS GET SERIOUS ABOUT REAL TAX REFORM IN THIS STATE.
THE GENERAL FUND SHOULD SHOULDER SOME OF THE BURDEN JUST LIKE IN OTHER STATES.
AND YES THE RICH SHOULD PAY MORE!
EYMANISM REALLY SET BACK PROGRESS IN THIS STATE AND NOW THAT EYMAN IS ALL BUT GONE, THE COST OF ACTING IS HIGHER THAN EVER AND FEAR IS DOING MORE THAN EYMAN EVER COULD.
GS, could you just post that in one post. It’s kinda annoying spread across 9.
Just say NO.
@18 The internal stupidity of the Democratic Party is an internal matter which we will fix on our own and which is none of your business.
Hey folks, check the update…
Will, you get both the Emily Littela and the Roseanne Roseannadanna awards. Well Done!
Re update: So they’re going to rely on MVET (read: car tabs) and sales tax? That’s even worse, because it’s even less user-fee oriented, and even more regressive. This turkey is a big fat “NO” vote from the get-go.
Do you really want to pay a 9.5% sales tax?
Hate to say it, but Vote NO —
— or —
WE WILL HAVE THE MOST REGRESSIVE STATE + LOCAL TAXES IN THE COUNTRY.
Let’s not be #1 on that score.
That’s the Big Problem with WA democrats. They are fucking oblivious when it comes to revenue policy. They slam the poorest among us the hardest with those damn sales taxes, and they have no qualms whatsoever about doing it.
Maybe 75 years from now, when tax attorneys living in Lake Stevens are whisked silently home in 15 mins from their downtown Seattle offices each evening on air conditioned Mag-Levs, while nebbish “program managers” slog through 90 mins of grinding stop and go to get from Cap Hill to Ballard, Seattle voters will finally wake up and wonder how in the hell did we ever become such pillow biters.
We’ll all line up with our pants around our ankles eager to vote yes for this screw job. I can’t wait till it’s my turn! I’ll skip the lube. I want it to hurt!
Here’s one simple way for Seattle voters to evaluate the RTID package, in terms of it’s potential impact to Seattle transportation versus the rest of the region:
The projects proposed by this RTID are indicated on the conceptual map of projects to be funded by lines made up of little squares. Compared to solid lines, indicating already funded projects underway (isn’t it interesting that they see fit to include those projects on their map).
So if we count up the number of little squares in the city, versus the number of little squares outside the city, we get some idea of where the money goes.
21 little squares inside Seattle
205 little squares outside Seattle
Then bear in mind that ten of Seattle’s little squares are there to make it easier, cheaper, and perhaps faster for folks in Lynnwood and Mountlake Terrace to get into the city. Cool! Seattle basically gets about 11 little squares (mostly for 60,000 people in West Seattle), and the rest of the taxing district gets over 200 little squares. That makes sense to me!
This is a moral issue. In Washington, the bottom income quintile (20%) — aka people with needs, like that family of three making $25,000 a year — pays a whopping 17% of their income in state and local income taxes. The top quintile pays just 4%. And in Oregon or Idaho, for comparison sake, each quintile from bottom to top pays a basically even 9% across the board.
What does this mean? In our Washington State, high income folks pay THOUSANDS of dollars a year less in state nad local taxes of all kinds, than they would if they lived in Oregon or Idaho….and our poorest families pay a few THOSAND dollars a year MORE than they would if they lived in Oregon or Idaho. Ouch — when you make $25000 a year paying $1500 or $2000 MORE actually and truly hurts.
Why? We are so dependent on the regressive sales tax.
So this roads + transit proposal is a SOAK the POOR proposal because it adds a huge slice to the sales tax.
Great. How fair and just. We are the 12th out of 50 States in GDP per capita and we want to finance a 50 year tax burden by making our taxes MORE UNFAIR to people with needs.
It should all be financed out of tolls and gas tax, obviously. And given that the Puget Sound transportation system is a State economic asset it should be funded on a statewide basis. That extra lane on I 90 out in Vantage was financed in part with gas taxes from Seattle and we sometimes drive there — all those folks outside the RTID zone also come and use the atransportation assets here. In fact many of them live in the parts of Pierce, Snohomish, King and Thurston counties that will pay NO additional taxes under the roads + transit proposal. Wow. Not just soak the poor — it’s soak the poor in the inner parts of King Pierce and snohomish — just where housing is already so affordable. How enlightened we are here in Pugetopolis!
Hey, thanks for the update. Turns out..it the new model is EVEN MORE skewed against the middle class and poor.
And.. by the way Ray-gun(not) Done, by the time the freeway is finished, those houses will be out of reach of young families.
A classic, Republican straw man argument.
“Pardon my goof, folks”
“The tax sources proposed to finance the Roads and Transit plan are a .8% MVET and a .6% sales tax increase. There is no license fee included in the plan, nor a local option gas tax. You will also notice a number of Seattle road projects in the current plan, that are not reflected in the 2004 plan that is discussed on the old web page.”
Oh that makes me feel so much better..thanks for clearing that up Julia!
Still Hell No!
Well ST1 was to be done in 2006 now we have ST2 and talking about a ST3. RTID1 has nothing in it to fix the congestion and chock points as promised in order to pass the gas tax of 9 ½ cents plus the 5 cents the year earlier. Hume there must be a RTID 2&3 coming.
While collecting years of taxes that should have fixed the congestion instead they spent it on studies, HOV, Bike lanes and everything but fixing the chock points. Now, by not doing anything but creating more congestion their hoping the public will buy into their programs. Vote NO on all tax increases until they fix the congestion and choking points.