One Lea Hill resident urged the Transportation Benefit District Board (TBD) on Monday not to impose a $20 vehicle license fee on Auburn residents because, he said, even that amount would mean hardship for people who are already struggling to make ends meet.
While the TBD did not say no to enacting the car tab fee, it did put off a vote on the issue until City staff can present to it more information about all of the district’s street needs, all the possible transportation projects that could be funded, project time lines, distinctions between street classifications. And until members have had a chance to study and digest the information.
“I would like to see a little more information about the mix between collectors and major arterials,” said board member Rich Wagner, noting the types of street maintenance projects the car tab fee would help fund.
Auburn’s five-year-old, state-authorized, City Council-created TBD is a quasi-municipal corporation to which the state has given authority to tax residents within its boundaries to fund transportation improvements without a public vote.
Although it is composed of the seven members of the city council and the mayor, legally speaking, the TBD and the city council are completely separate entities.
Should the board implement the car tab fee, said Kevin Snyder, director of community development and public works for the City of Auburn, City staff expect it to raise about $800,000 annually to help cover the costs of maintaining arterial and collector roads. Minus administrative costs, Snyder estimated that would leave about $750,000 to put toward transportation projects.
“By state law, we can’t spend it on residential streets,” Snyder said.
Today, the City of Auburn spends about $1.5 to $2 million annually on its arterial street preservation program. Maintenance of residential streets, however, falls under the auspices of the separate Save Our Streets program.
Should the board approve the car tab fee resolution, collection of revenue would not start for six months. During that time the board would be required to work with the Department of Licensing and Department of Revenue to set up the necessary protocols and procedures.
Later, the City could choose to subsume the TBD and take over management of such transportation projects as are funded by the car tab revenues or it could dissolve the board.
City staff also schooled board members on two alternatives to the car tab fee.
One alternative would be a City of Auburn Street Safety levy lift, which would allow the City to increase the existing tax levy by more than 1 percent. The levy lid would have to state the percentage of the annual increase or tie it to some scale, for example to the Consumer Price Index.
The second would be a voter-approved, .02 percent sales and use tax increase. Valid for 10 years, such an increase must be re-approved by another vote unless approved for repayment of a bond issue.
“We anticipate that that would raise $3.7 million annually,” Snyder said, noting that these monies could be paired with the City’s existing $1.5 to $2 million arterial street preservation program through a contractual relationship with the City Council.
This alternative would require an intensive public outreach and education campaign before a vote to help district residents understand what a sales and use tax increase would mean to them, how it would affect them, and how funds could be expended.
And, hopefully, added board member Largo Wales, educate the public on the crucial distinctions between the different types of streets — what pot of money funds this sort and what funds that sort.
“As I go out and meet people, I want to speak (about) all of the roads and give them a total picture and say things like, ‘these are only for residential roads, and this is what we are doing’ because community members do not understand that some streets are arterials and some are this other,” said Wales.
Recently state lawmakers approved an amendment to existing law that allows TBDs to approve conditional increases in car tax fees without a public vote, but only after the fee has already been in place for 24 months.
