Mayor and council too often proceed from the presumption that there "must" be another car-tab fee increase--or introduction of fresh levies---when
voters and taxpayers are under great economic pressure in their own lives and when they rightly question how prior monies have been spent.

Before it even studies further a goofy new streetcar venture, for instance, the city must see that public safety, basic city services, transportation infrastructure maintenance and repair, and other cornerstone functions are being funded and provided efficiently.

Mayor Schell was rejected because, after the WTO and Mardi Gras disorders, he was perceived as unable to deliver public safety. Mayor Nickels got dumped, in part, because he was perceived as unable to get the streets cleared in a minor snow storm. The day-to-day stuff is what matters to
the vast majority of citizens. When they feel it is in competent hands, then they'll entertain proposals for something more.

A little historical perspective might help here. Levy fatigue originated with Sam Levy who, waking up one morning after a long night in the bars, stared into the mirror and said, "I've had enough." Unfortunately, it turned out that Grover Norquist was hiding just out of sight behind the bathroom door. He got Sam to sign a pledge in blood right then and there before Sam even had a chance to gulp down his morning cup of coffee.

But there is hope. An anonymous City Hall insider tells me that Gap Levy has scheduled an appointment with an orthodontist. So his problem may be about to get fixed. And word has it that Parks Levy is pondering discreetly slipping out of town and checking into the Betty Ford Clinic. He thinks the experience would renew him.

Hopefully the author is correct that there will not be another attempt at a car tab increase. But, he left out a few important points.

He neglected to mention that the City Council did pass a $20 car tab increase this year, which about half the car owners in Seattle have not yet paid. And that the King County Council passed its own $20 car tab increase which will go into effect starting Jan. 1. So, next year Seattle car owners will be paying $40 more per vehicle per year than they paid in 2010. When they actually have to start paying this extra $40/vehicle -- which many people are not even aware is going to happen -- the mood of Seattle voters is going to be even more anti-car tab increase than it was in the Prop 1 election.

Also, what if the state does pass a 0.5% sales tax increase? Will Seattle voters be in the mood for another car tab increase on top of the $40 of increases just passed and an additional 0.5% sales tax increase?

Royer also misunderstands why Prop 1 failed. Voters are not interested in "faster transit" or "safer streets." They want streets repaired and maintained. And they don't want car tabs increased, period. In a survey the city did earlier this year, voters considered "late buses" to be one of the least important transportation issues in their neighborhoods. Making transit faster is not a priority for most people, at all. Neither is "safer streets." Seattle streets are some of the very safest in the entire country among cities of similar size.

"Faster transit" and "safer streets" are just a couple of red herrings the city created in their war against cars. This is just an excuse to create more "road diets", curb bulbs, bike paths, etc., which the average Seattle voter is strongly opposed to.

It is really shameful how the city is constantly trying to pull the wool over its citizens eyes in their attempt to force their anti-car agenda on a public which does not share that view.

Lincoln writes:

So, next year Seattle car owners will be paying $40 more per vehicle per year than they paid in 2010. When they actually have to start paying this extra $40/vehicle -- which many people are not even aware is going to happen -- the mood of Seattle voters is going to be even more anti-car tab increase than it was in the Prop 1 election. (Emphasis supplied).

Lincoln’s points are based on a flawed analysis. It’s as if he fails to grasp how the courts characterize the fundamental nature of vehicle licensing taxes. Where Lincoln runs off the tracks with his analysis is that he uses common sense but he ignores the law.

The justices of the supreme court of this state recently determined – in unambiguous terms – that paying car tab taxes is entirely voluntary. Here’s where they did that:

****************

[Car tab] taxes are involuntary because, Appellants reason, the only available means
of avoiding payment is to relinquish the beneficial use of one's property (i.e., not registering for use on public roadways). . . .

[Car tab] taxes satisfy the requirement that excise taxes must be voluntary. There is no inherent requirement that residents of the taxing districts own or continue to own a motor vehicle. Certainly, many residents within the Authorities' districts do not own such vehicles. Similarly, there is no requirement that a vehicle owner drive his or her vehicle or, if a resident chooses to drive, that the resident use public roadways. A vehicle owner may, for instance, use his or her vehicle on private land without registration. See RCW 82.44.010(2)(c) (exemption for vehicles used entirely on private property).

-- _Sheehan v. Central Puget Sound Regional Transit Authority_, 155 Wn.2d 790 (2005).

****************

There you have it. Paying car tab taxes is entirely voluntary . . . that legal issue is SETTLED in this state.

Sell your cars, then you won’t have to pay. Choose to not drive your car on public roads next year and you won’t have to pay. Choose to drive your car only on private property in the future and you won’t have to pay.

Ignorance of the law is no excuse, Lincoln. Next time a little less of what “feels right” to you, and a little more reality if you don’t mind!

I think that the Seattle public is actually totally on board with the pro-environment/pro-transit/pro-biking agenda ("anti-car agenda"). Seattleites by and large love the bike lanes, love the ideal of a fast and reliable public transit network (and are disappointed ours falls short that ideal). Opposition to these projects comes from a decided minority within the city limits and from vocal commuters from outside the city limits.

If the council does go for some other kind of transportation tax based on cars, I'd like to urge them to tax mileage, gas, or Blue Book value and avoid the whole flat-fee thing. There are tons of other innovative, nonregressive revenue approaches they could consider with as well. For instance, they could impose a payroll tax on people who live farther than X miles away from Seattle but who work in Seattle. Many other cities do this so that people outside the city are paying for at least a small share of their infrastructure consumption and pollution they case in the city. People who take the bus or train or telecommute a certain number of days per week could be exempt.

However, whatever projects a levy would fund should be well thought-out and the legislation written in such as way that it is concrete, not wasteful, and that raised monies go to designated projects. If the council can do all these things, Seattleites would probably go for it.

crossrip: right. And if you never buy anything, you don't have to pay the sales tax either.

Has anyone ever told you you're a genius?

smacgry: Your little personal opinion is very convincing. However, I prefer to rely on surveys to judge the public's feelings on various matters.

Here is the survey done by the city on transportation issues:

http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/docs/ctac/CTAC%20III%20Survey%20Summary_FINAL.pdf

"CTAC III Phone Survey – Summary of Key Findings
Overview
Input from the community informs the Citizens Transportation Advisory Committee III’s (CTAC III) findings and recommendations to the City Council and Mayor related to the review and assessment of the City’s transportation funding system and a potential Seattle Transportation Benefit District ballot measure."

On page 2, the top 2 transportation issues facing Seattle, "buses/bus routes/late buses" got only 3% vote; light rail got only 5% vote; "traffic/congestion" got 28% and "potholes/poor pavement" got 19%. When you add in "Alaskan Way Viaduct" and "SR 520 Bridge", road issues combined to get 73% of votes. You will note that bicycle infrastructure did not get even 3% of votes, and was not in the top ten.

Then, on page 3, two most important transportation issues in your own neighborhood, "potholes/poor pavement" got 26%; "traffic/congestion" got 21%; "buses/bus routes/late buses" got only 5%; and "light rail/monorail" got only 4%. Again, bicycle infrastructure was not even in the top 10% and did not get even 3% of respondents naming it one of the top 2 transportation issues in their neighborhoods.

So, you are welcome to your little uninformed opinions. But, as this survey shows, they don't represent anyone but you.

smacgry writes:

I think that the Seattle public is actually totally on board with the pro- nvironment/pro-transit/pro-biking agenda ("anti-car agenda"). . . .
. . .
However, whatever projects a levy would fund should be well thought-out and the legislation written in such as way that it is concrete, not wasteful, and that raised monies go to designated projects. If the council can do all these things, Seattleites would probably go for it.

That all certainly is the conventional wisdom among the political leadership. Heck, they can get Seattleites to vote over 50% for just about anything with the word transit in it. Look at the 2002 monorail ballot measure: car tab taxes for a designated, concrete, “pro-environment/pro-transit/pro-biking agenda”. Ballot measures like that are easy sells to the voters here; it’s why McGinn says a transit-only car tab tax measure would pass next year.

Problem is though, the tax hike measures in the name of transit that are put on the ballots around here set bad policies:

-- Sound Transit’s financing plan is nothing short of grossly abusive in comparison to all its peers’ financing plans (those rely for the most part on existing taxes, taxes on businesses, and federal grants);

-- the five Metro tax hikes since ‘73 gave it far more regressive tax impacts on the people here than its peers; and

-- the monorail ballot measure resulted in $200 million of completely wasted car tab tax revenue.

smacgry – you reference in your post how the legislation going forward should be written well. What do you mean by that?

Are you referring to taxpayer-protection provisions? The state legislation for the failed TBD tax hike that just appeared on the Seattle ballot contained none of those. ST2 contains no taxpayer protection provisions. The ones that supposedly were in the monorail ballot measure turned out to be nothing but empty slogans. What standards and limits would you insist on smacgry in any future “transit” legislation and/or ballot measures?

Yes, data is good:

http://www.friendsofseattle.org/2010-poll-resources-walking-biking-riding-transit

"Contrary to recent polling data that found that Seattlites don't favor the sacrifice of traffic lanes and dollars for alternative transportation infrastructure, the poll found that voters actually favor these investments over resources allocated to n car traffic. We think the difference is that this poll presented voters with questions about priorities and values."

@Crossrip:

Well-written legislation means, first, avoiding regressive tax regimes to achieve the stated transportation goals, and, second, laying out reasonable and concrete projects for funding not subject to later reallocation by the council. The tax levy that just failed had stupid things in it, like the $18 million on studying street cars, and everyone agrees it was written in a surprisingly vague way, leaving plenty of wiggle room for the council to reallocate monies (which the council has often done in the past when it could, e.g. Bridging the Gap and sidewalks). A levy measure would need to be worded to prevent the council from redirecting money so people could trust more in the measure efficacy. I'm not an expert in drafting legislation, so please don't expect me to ad-lib the necessary wording to achieve this on a little Web form, but I don't think it's exactly rocket science for future levy authors to do their due diligence to safeguard the public purse appropriately.

Seattle residents have benefitted greatly by the defeat of the Commons levies in 1995 and 1996, the defeat of the 10 cent latte tax, the defeat of the 20 cent grocery bag tax, and the defeat of the $60 dollar flat rate car tab tax. Overturning soda and candy taxes at the state level was a huge victory. The survival of the phased in 9.5 cent raising of the state gas tax in years back was a negative. A huge success was the removal of the 0.5% sales tax on restaurants, bars, and labor intensive food and beverages that resulted from the Safeco Field bonds being paid off early and the tax not being extended for nominal and mediocre cultural purposes.

Time for an employer based head tax.

$25 per driver
$15 per transit rider
$10 per bicyclist
$ 5 per walker

No transit is free and all users of the roadway need to pay for their usage. You can argue about the exact dollars per group, but each group costs the city money.

GaryP -- Local taxes like those you've posted are an incentive for employers to move and for employees to lie. Transit riders (as such) pay a mere fourth of the system's operating costs, none of the capital costs. Who else is subsidized to such an extent?

Seattle voters have had 2 chances this year to prove that they prefer to spend money on transit/bicycle infrastructure rather than on roads.

They chose the tunnel over the "surface/transit" option for the AWV replacement overwhelmingly, even though a lot of people, like myself, voted against the tunnel because we prefferred a new viaduct, not the surface option.

And they chose to defeat Prop 1, which taxed cars to spend most of the revenue on transit/bicycle infrastructure. Prop 1 also went down by double digits.

So, if Seattle voters truly do value transit and bicycle infrastructure over roads and bridges, they certainly did not put their money where their mouths were in those two votes. Those two votes showed just the opposite.

Those two votes, and two recent credible polls/surveys of Seattle voters all show that Seattleites want more money spent on repairing and maintaining our roads and bridges, and not on transit or bicycle infrastructure.

@ Lincoln " This is just an excuse to create more "road diets", curb bulbs, bike paths, etc., which the average Seattle voter is strongly opposed to."

Just when Mike and Mike think themselves masters of the U.S urbane pack, the British come up with yet another reason to redo the re-drafted Transit Master Plan now being readied for adoption:
http://www.treehugger.com/urban-design/new-idea-for-sharing-urban-roads-sidewalks.html

;-) at least I think so

@afreeman -- Be careful! Seattle (unlilke London) already has miles & miles of streets without sidewalks, mostly without painted pavement. Those who live there don't like it much.

But you're on to something. Hans Monderman (linked from your link) believed that too much signage and pavement paint distracts drivers from attending to what's really important: where are the other drivers, and pedestrians? The proliferation of signs and pavement paint is itself a cause of driver distraction, and under McGinn it's getting out of hand.

As a bicyclist I want Seattle to spend money fixing the dang potholes and cracks. Being slower than cars I can see every one of them. Besides, when the city fixes a road it also brings it up to "the plan" which means adding sharrows, sidewalks, bike lanes, and road diets.

So yes, a 100% road repair fee is the way to go.

people also seem to forget that we were abused by artifically high car tab renewal fees for many years in washington, and the legislature refused to adjust problem when asked. Like tim eyman or not, he tapped into this upset and it became his first and most successful initiative to reduce those unfair taxes.

Lincoln, anyone who disses "curb bulbs" gets a sympathetic listen from me. Those stupid, anal, prissy devices (did I say stupid?) help pedestrians in no way but do prevent right turns, passage of emergency vehicles and the like. Yet, after twenty years or so, the Street Engineering Dept. cheerfully adds them to any paving contract that crosses their desk. What happens to intelligent people who hire on with the City?

"Curb Bulbs"

Street Films has a blurb on how they help pedestrians.

http://www.streetfilms.org/snowy-neckdowns-redux-winter-traffic-calming/#more-49170