It’s possible you may have seen the note circulating in Republican circles about how any repeal of the car tax is off the table, will not be considered, is D.O.A. Fine and dandy.
But let’s also be honest about the car tax…neither party has clean skirts on this one.
Go back to then-Gov. Tim Kaine’s final budget proposal in 2009. Kaine, looking for ways to close a massive budget shortfall, proposed ending state car tax reimbursement for localities. He also floated the idea of ending the tax entirely — and giving localities the option to impose a one percent income tax to make up for their lost revenue.
It was a non-starter.
But in the course of his discussion of the car tax, Kaine called out the legislators for not making full car tax elimination a priority, and even capping total reimbursement at $950 million in 2004 (it was to have been fully eliminated in 2002). He said they didn’t take the matter seriously.
He was dead wrong, however, when he said no one had come forward to fully repeal the tax as initially promised. Former Del. Jeff Frederick carried just such a bill in 2008 and it died in a House Finance subcommittee (on a voice vote).
He did the same thing in 2009…and again, it was left in the House Finance committee.
Was Kaine’s charge right about seriousness correct? The bill record would indicate he was.
That Republicans have their backs up now in defense of what remains of Jim Gilmore’s signature issue is admirable on some level. The idea was originally intended to act as a deterrent to additional state spending. To a degree, it probably has been, which is why the great and good despise even the truncated version of the plan so much.
Is it better to defend the remnant than to surrender it entirely? Politically, yes. But let’s also remember that the desire to carry out the original plan faded a decade ago.
