With a deadline looming, the county board wrestled on July 23, 2013 with an opportunity to authorize a new tax. The state has authorized counties to impose a wheelage tax of $10 a year for certain types of vehicles over the next four years and up to $20 a year starting in 2018.
The tax would apply to vehicles such as cars, pickups, busses, and commercial trucks but not to motorcycles, RVs, and semis. For a small fee, the state could collect the tax along with vehicle license renewals on behalf of the county. The revenue projected for Cook County would be approximately $52,780 a year and would help fund projects on county-owned roads. In order for the state to collect the tax in 2014, the county would need to give the state notice by August 1.
Cook County Highway Engineer David Betts recommended that the board authorize the tax.
Commissioner Bruce Martinson said he would rather see increased sales taxes or a levy increase, because this is a regressive tax that would have greater impact the lower a vehicle owner’s income was.
Commissioner Garry Gamble said he empathized with the Highway Department’s need for funding and pointed out that $10 a year amounted to just over 83 cents month. “The problem is, it’s nibble, nibble, nibble, nibble,” he said. “Cumulatively, it’s a problem. …We can’t just keep adding taxes.”
A ½ percent county sales tax recently authorized by the state to cover certain things including specific local road projects would be more fair, Commissioner Gamble said, because tourists would help pay for the roads they were using. A wheelage tax would put the burden on the locals. “I really have an aversion to an additional tax on the local population,” he said. Their choice was to cause the Highway Department pain by denying the wheelage tax or to pass the pain on to the locals, he said.
The county’s roads is the topic she has received the most phone calls about since she became commissioner, Sue Hakes said. She said she thought the state would take note if the county chose not to collect a tax it was authorized to collect.
Maintenance Supervisor Russell Klegstad said it’s a fair tax because only the people who used the roads would pay the tax. Some roads are used almost exclusively by locals, he said. He only gets calls about County Road 45 from locals, whereas he gets calls about Caribou and Sawbill roads from tourists as well as locals.
“No tax is completely fair,” Commissioner Bruce Martinson said. With an additional sales tax that would include a tax on gasoline, the person getting 15 miles per gallon would pay three times the tax that someone getting 45 miles per gallon would pay, he said.
A person having a hard time paying for everyday expenses would have a harder time paying an extra percentage on sales tax, Commissioner Heidi Doo- Kirk said.
A wheelage tax could be used on any number of road and bridge projects, Engineer Betts said, but the ½ percent sales tax authorized by the state could only be used for one specific project at a time and then would end. The proposed wheelage tax represents about 4 percent of the Highway Department levy, and not imposing it could require a 4 percent levy increase, he said.
A motion to not impose a wheelage tax at this time passed unanimously. The board could implement the tax in the future.
In other county news:
. The board authorized the replacement of a Recorder’s Office scanner that was destroyed during a recent power outage. The machine is obsolete and replacement parts are not available. An insurance claim has been filed.
. Several hirings were approved by the board: Jennifer Friest as an eligibility worker in the Public Health & Human Services Department, Wesley Higgins as the assistant mechanic in the Highway Department, and Amity Goettl as a dispatcher/jailer (she is returning to this job, leaving the sheriff’s administrative assistant position open).
. The board approved three interim use permits allowing RVs for habitation: Chris and Kenya Jahnke on Camp 20 Road, Randi Nelson on County Road 8, and Evan and Nancy Anderson on Lake Superior in Schroeder. While the planning commission had recommended permits for two, three, and four years, respectively, the county board approved two years for each. All three were renewals.
County ordinance also allows conditional use permits for long-term use of RVs on permanent foundations. Commissioner Sue Hakes expressed concern about property values being reduced when RVs are placed on lakeshore properties, however.
. A Great Lakes Restoration Initiative grant to combat invasive species, administered through the U.S. Forest Service, was modified to reflect an increase in funding. The original amount in March 2011 was $100,000, but now the grant is for $172,501. It will require a 20 percent match, which Highway Engineer David Betts said is almost entirely covered by the Highway Department maintenance staff’s mowing of invasive species.
Leave a Reply