House approves $9 billion roads bill

In a rare Saturday session in March, the Minnesota House approved a $9.1 billion transportation funding bill after a long debate that previewed months of continuing political battles over taxes and spending.

The bipartisan measure would boost levies on gasoline, vehicles and general sales to build and maintain the state's roads and transit for the next 10 years, a long-neglected and critical need according to proponents.

It passed 83 to 46, seven votes short of the support needed to override an expected veto from Gov. Tim Pawlenty. The bill's next stop will be a conference committee to resolve differences with a more expensive version of the bill that cleared the Senate on Friday.

The transportation funding showdown of the past two days was only the first of many Capitol skirmishes expected this year over taxes.

Some DFLers are proposing raising income taxes on the wealthiest Minnesotans in order to cut the burden on the less fortunate. On Saturday, Republican House members criticized the array of taxes in the transportation bill as hitting the poor and middle class too hard.

It's too early to tell how this complex fiscal brew will turn out as DFLers flex their big new legislative majorities before the tax-averse Republican governor. But judging from the results of GOP attempts to amend the transportation bill on Saturday, the sales-tax initiative may stand the least chance of becoming law.

Both the House and Senate transportation measures would add 10 cents to the state's longtime gas tax of 20 cents a gallon, boost registration renewal fees on cars purchased in the future and authorize a half-cent general sales-tax increase in the metro area.

The proposed increases in vehicle taxes and fees weren't challenged at all on Saturday, and efforts to eliminate the gas-tax hike were voted down by 2-to-1 ratios. Those revenues are dedicated mostly or entirely to roads and bridges.

The proposed transportation sales tax, however, would tilt more toward financing mass transit. One amendment to remove it drew significant support, and an attempt to make it subject to a voter referendum in the Twin Cities area fell just three votes short of adoption.

A view from above

The action Saturday unfolded before Jean Huhta of Maple Grove, who took her grandson to see the sights of the Capitol but unexpectedly got to watch some actual lawmaking from a third-floor visitors' gallery.

Her judgment on the proceedings: "I'm always interested in how our tax dollars are spent. It depends on where that tax money goes. We do need more highways and upkeep."

On the floor below, legislators constantly invoked the interests of folks like Huhta, a hospital instruments technician whose job doesn't ordinarily allow her to see the Legislature in action.

"Joe Sixpack back home does not need more tax increases," argued House Minority Leader Marty Seifert, R-Marshall. "This is a morbidly obese tax increase and it's going to the packinghouse of the governor's office."

Other Republican critics repeatedly claimed that the House bill would extract more than $500 a year in new levies from an average family. But chief sponsor Rep. Bernie Lieder, DFL-Crookston, said that many drivers who don't buy a new car would pay no more than $5 a month in higher gas taxes.

Rep. Al Juhnke, DFL-Willmar, said the measure would provide lots of property tax relief for homeowners straining under county levies -- from which he said up to a third of the revenue goes to transportation needs left unfunded by the state.

"And almost every dollar in this bill goes to jobs in Minnesota," Juhnke added.

But Rep. Paul Kohls, R-Victoria, denounced the bill as a "taxapalooza" and lingered over the lyrics of a Beatles song: "If you drive a car, I'll tax the street ... If you take a walk, I'll tax your feet, 'cause I'm the taxman."

And Majority Leader Tony Sertich, DFL-Chisholm, quoted the iconic Republican President Ronald Reagan's plea for a 5-cent increase in the federal gas tax a quarter-century ago.

A bellwether for taxes

After years of little or no legislative action on transportation as metro freeway congestion has grown and rural highways crumbled, Capitol observers say that tax hikes for roads and transit have the most political momentum of the many revenue-raising ideas being offered this session.

So if new transportation funding fails, the overall tax-raising pace will undoubtedly slow.

Whether any taxes can be raised over a Pawlenty veto, however, looks more doubtful after the votes of the past two days. While the House bill drew five suburban GOP supporters Saturday, four outstate DFLers voted no. And several Republicans who voted in favor on Saturday said they wouldn't abandon their party's governor in an override vote.

DFL leaders, however, have suggested that a scaled-down transportation bill will eventually become law this spring, with or without Pawlenty's cooperation.

"He's a reasonable man," Lieder said. "He can maybe change his mind."

Conrad deFiebre • 651-222-1673 • cdefiebre@startribune.com