HONOLULU (AP) – Hawaii drivers would be charged higher annual fees on their vehicles to help repair the state’s well-worn roads, according to legislation that passed the House Transportation Committee on Wednesday.
Vehicle registration fees would increase from $25 to $45 a year, and weight fees would approximately double, with the heaviest vehicles paying the highest rates.
The new charges would raise a combined $56 million a year for paving, repairs, drainage, traffic signs, guardrails, lighting, sidewalks, landscaping and storm cleanup on nearly 2,500 miles of state roads.
With an estimated 1.1 million vehicles statewide, the increases amount to an additional $51 in yearly fees required for each vehicle, on average.
“We have a big backlog of highway improvements and filling the potholes,” said House Transportation Committee Chairman Joe Souki, D-Waihee-Wailuku. “If we want to maintain the highways, we need to put money in the highway funds. You get what you pay for.”
Money that’s supposed to be set aside for road maintenance has been taken by lawmakers to help balance the state’s general fund budget in recent years, and now highway funds need to be replenished, Souki said.
The fee increases would be paid into the Highway Special Fund, and they wouldn’t be used to help balance the state’s $800 million projected budget deficit over the next two fiscal years.
But charging higher vehicle fees would hurt the economy and raise the cost of a Hawaii vacation for tourists who rent cars, said Christine Ogawa Karamatsu, testifying for Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Alamo Rent A Car and National Car Rental.
“Much of this increase will be passed onto Enterprise’s customers in the form of higher rental fees,” she said in written testimony. “Ultimately, this will make the cost of a Hawaii vacation less attractive than other comparable visitor destination areas.”
She estimated the fees would cost her companies a combined $1.1 million for its fleet of cars.
The fees haven’t been raised since 1991, and the state’s highways have fallen into disrepair, said Sen. Kalani English, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, which approved similar bills earlier this week.
“The bottom line is that it’s needed,” said English, D-East Maui-Lanai-Molokai. “If you go on this current path, then we’re going to have very dangerous highways.”
These proposals previously passed both the House and Senate, but the bills died in conference committee last year.
The legislation will next be considered by each chamber’s money committees.
Separate bills also are pending that would start pilot programs to tax drivers based on how far they drive instead of how much gas they buy, an idea known as the vehicle mileage tax (VMT).
By Mark Niesse
February 3, 2011 – 11:16 AM
