PIERRE, S.D. (AP) - Among ideas suggested to replenish South Dakota's depleted road-building fund is a plan to tax drivers on the basis of how many miles they travel.
State Rep. Shantel Krebs, R-Sioux Falls, said such a formula is being tested in Oregon and may work in South Dakota.
A legislative committee is studying the state's highway needs and funding.
The state gas tax brought in almost $121 million for the fiscal year that ended June 30. That's a 4 percent increase, but doesn't meet the state's needs for highway funding.
The tax can't carry the load in the future, the vice chairman of the study panel says.
"We have to make some major changes in the way we pay for roads," says Rep. Gordon Pederson, R-Wall. "Two or 3 cents more a gallon on the gas tax isn't going to cut it."
Krebs said taxing motorists for each mile they drive would ensure that those who use roads the most are paying their fair share of the wear and tear.
Three-fourths of South Dakota's road-building money comes from the federal government, but the future of those funds is in doubt.
The needs study comes in at a time when the federal highway trust fund runs a multibillion-dollar shortfall, the state's highway reserves almost are gone, and state gas tax revenue has been all but flat for much of the decade.
"Every state, and the federal government, is being hit with the same problem, one way or another," Pederson said. "We can't rely on somebody else to solve it for us."
Study committee member Rep. Dan Ahlers, D-Dell Rapids, said the Oregon vehicle-miles tax plan worries him.
"Sometimes that vehicle is part of the business, so when you raise the cost, that means the cost of goods goes up," he said.
He wants the committee to hit upon a funding plan that "puts the cost out to the broadest base possible, and we need to make sure that the people using vehicles that do the most damage are paying more for the roads. What the end product is, I don't know yet."
