Both the N&R and the Winston-Salem Journal weighed in on the Senate budget proposal to hike the registration fee for electric and hybrid cars, reasoning that they’re not paying they’re fair share of the gas taxes.
The N&R ponders the issue in the context of declining revenues for road construction due to overall better gas mileage in today’s vehicles, while the Journal says it’s just plain unfair:
The General Assembly, after first attacking state regulations that protect our air, land and water, is now targeting the pocketbooks of environmentally conscious North Carolina drivers.
..In essence, the hybrid owner is being taxed double, first by the gas tax and then by the higher registration fee. As for miniscule number of electric cars on our roads, most have fuel tanks and all use electricity upon which the motorists paid a utility tax.
The senatorial argument for this tax appears insincere, at best. Given the animus that the Republican-led legislature has directed at environmental programs for the last three years, a more believable purpose behind the higher fees appears to payback against North Carolinians who exhibit environmental sensibility by using gas-sipping cars.
Key phrase being “miniscule number of electric cars.” Personally I have a buyer-be-ware philosophy on both hybrids and electric cars. By the same token it’s not like electric cars aren’t already already subsidized, and that registration hikes haven’t been a target to help fund public transportation agencies like PART, a strategy that local county commissioners kn ow straight up isn’t going to fly with their constituents.
