Why would you need a GPS system to keep track of how many miles people are driving? Couldn’t you just hook something up to the odometer and record the mileage that way? It wouldn’t surprise me if they were trying to come up with a tracking system to know where everyone is going though.

Way too many things can go wrong with this. What if I live in Vancouver and work in Portland?

Mileage tax is bad, but an increase in gas taxes while gas is cheap is a good idea. Gas never should have been alllowed to get so cheap to make large SUV’s attractive.

Kulongoski is as worthless as a Governor as you can get.

He loves to put his name on things that work, and blame the non liberals if they don’t.

Greed will put My State in the same boat as GM is in. Of course, Portland is a bicycle worshiping city, and I’m sure they think this is a great idea. It’s bad enough the State won’t make more roads and embrace toy trains instead.

Sigh

Let’s see… the government wants to equip your vehicle with a GPS tracking system but it promises not to track you. Here, let me stamp “Stupid” on your forehead but I promise nobody will be able to see it.

I should say “when they embrace toy trains instead”.

We could use a new bypass or two.

Here in NY they inspect vehicles every year. It would work if they recorded the mileage when doing yearly inspections or something (at least in these states that do inspections). But then again that would likely mean people would have to pay the taxes all at once.. and that may not work out too well.

Vancover to Portland? That one heck of a commute.

Why not a MPG tax, base of the cars Window Sticker, the smaller the car the smaller the tax. In California your registration is base of the weight of the car and on top we still have the Nations highest Gas tax, I know that the window stickers MPG is not right on the money, but it is a ball park…

why don’t they just keep the gas tax? it’s easier and there is no Big Brother watching you.
With gas down below 1.50 why not just increase the gas tax? and with all this mumbo jumbo about people not buying as much gas-bull****, I still see just as many people at every gas station buying the same amount of gas, it’s not like everyone overnight decided to drive half as much, I think they just got rid of the idiots that “predicted” the gas prices…

If everybody is driving electric cars in Oregon, then Kulongoski is a genius.

If Kulongoski is a true politician, Oregon will have both taxes running concurrently just to be safe.

I hate it how the people in Washington always look to take our money so they can give it to their friends and waste it. What gives them that right?

Here’s an idea: LET US KEEP OUR MONEY. We work hard for our money. The people in Washington should just SPEND LESS!!!!! We should get the people in Washington to make the sacrifices. Let them SPEND LESS!

Why should we always pay their bills? It’s not moral and it doesn’t make any sense to take people’s money away from them… It’s like legal theft.

Plus, the last thing we need during these hard economic times would be an increase in taxes…

Thinbev,

Actually read the article and respond to that. Oregon, a state not the Federal government, is looking to find some way to maintain the flow of money for transportation. While, I am not nearly as cynical as some think I should be when it comes to government, the fact is that more fuel efficient vehicles means less gas tax money which in turns means less money to build and/or maintain roads bridges and signage and so on.

Also your argument about not having to “pay their bills” forgets that everything outside you house that is not grass and trees and the animals in between did not appear by the grace of GOD. Someone had to pay for it. Guess what? We do with our taxes.

If you can find a better way to pay for the roads, bridges, signs, and the rest of the transportation infrastructure of our nation or any nation with more than 10,000 people, then please offer one up otherwise, shut your useless whining hole.

Adults have to pay the bills. Kids just pretend that day will never come while they run them up.

As an Oregonian who saw the phone companies absolved of warrantless wiretapping, I’d say no to this measure.

Recording odometer figures would be one thing…but then watch the odometer rollback stats skyrocket.

And let’s do the math:

If I drive 15k miles per year and my car averages 28mpg, I pay about $128.57/year in fuel taxes at $0.24/gallon.

If I drive 15k miles per year, and I pay 1.2 cents/mile, I’m paying $180/year.

While a tax increase of $51.43 per year isn’t much, it’s still a rise of 40% over the current system, plus I get the government tracking my car.

Not to mention the fact that this system seems to punish people in rural or suburban areas, while it benefits city-dwellers, who already have the option of carpooling and/or one of the best mass-transit systems in the country.

The incentive isn’t to buy more fuel-efficient cars…it’s to drive less. But that isn’t an option for more than half our (10th-largest in area) state’s population. It might actually cause an even higher truck-to-car sales ratio due to the cheaper gas. So someone can buy a 15mpg SUV, drive it the same distance as someone in a 45mpg Prius, and pay no more in taxes.

Plus, as jackjim noted, what of the 200,000 people in Vancouver/ Clark County, WA commuting over the bridge? Unless there are two different sets of pumps (one with taxed gas and one without), it’ll only encourage more people to live in Van-tucky instead of Portland (so they can live state income tax-free in WA and simply commute to Oregon to buy without sales tax, and refuel without a gas tax), which will EXTEND their commuting distances, which will have the OPPOSITE effect this law would.

This law would be stupid, stupid, stupid.

Tracking every car would not only be a legal nightmare, it’d be very easy to defeat the tracking system. Simply block the signal from the GPS system’s antenna. Only uncover it for three or four miles a week of driving.

If they’re going to go with a usage monitoring/taxation system, an easier, cheaper, and more practical way to do it would be to increase fuel taxes but offer a rebate to promote conservation. It could be done with a magnetic stripe on your driver’s license or a special gas card or a transponder (like at toll booths) that has to be swiped/scanned at gas stations. Raise fuel taxes by a quarter a gallon, but offer a discount on the first so many gallons per year, say 25 cents off for the first 500 gallons, and after that first 500 gallons you pay more tax. It could even be done in steps: 25 cents for the first 500 gallons, 15 cents for the next 500, a nickel for the next 500, and nothing after that. Forget your license (or fuel card or transponder) at home? Out of state driver? Then you pay the full price with full taxes. A system like this would preserve tax revenue while promoting conservation by rewarding drivers for consuming less (either by driving more efficient vehicles or simply by driving less).

The transponder idea would probably be the best one (compared to magnetic stripes/fuel cards), since it could be car-specific (this would prevent single car/multi driver families from pooling their discounts and never paying the tax – picture “Junior, I’ve gotta fill the car, let’s go to the gas station so I can use your discount”). Transponders wouldn’t be cheap, but they’d have to be cheaper than GPS systems, and since it could only be read at gas pumps (make it a low power transponder with a range of only a few feet to keep the government honest) it couldn’t track vehicle movement. To prevent transponder theft or sharing (picture craigslist ad “Use my transponder to save gas money”) give them some sort of theft deterrence system like car stereos, where they have to be reset if disconnected from the vehicle. To lessen inconvent legitimate resets caused by dead batteries, allow the resets to be done at gas stations (clerk says “Yup, your transponder matches your plate number, so you’re OK).

Our government never fails to find a way to tax us more.

TIme for another Tea Party.

Or how about we just skip the system, and NOT tax us any further.

You know how much all the combined bailouts are going to cost Americans? $20,000 dollars each. I’ve said it before, I think it would do much better to give each American $20,000.

We don’t need MORE taxes. And the government doesn’t need MORE money. They need to spend LESS money.

Furthermore, I don’t need the government tracking my car. PERIOD.

Lastly, gas prices won’t skyrocket back to $4 a gallon (don’t need to implore this statement- of course, who knows, but check the market and check back). People have seen through the mist, and have seen the truth about gas prices (being that much if it is inflated guessing into the future, investing beforehand). However, that doesn’t mean it won’t go back to pretty ridiculous amounts. But most people have past the global warming fraud, the large profits (no, I’m not saying it was caused by companies), the investments in place, etc.. What I’m saying is, there’s no need for our government to tax us on oil for profit, it’s nearly a necessary commodity. Not one we can’t rid ourselves of, but one that will take time. There’s no way to avoid using gas, so what’s the point in a gas tax? Drive a bit less. Sorry, but the answer isn’t driving less. The answer lies in the energy I use to get from point A to B.

jayjc08: Yes, oil is pretty much a necessity, but so are roads. Who is going to pay for them?

I’m with Jay.

We try to be “green” and conservative in times of crisis, just like we were asked to do, and crap like this is how we are rewarded!

Governments don’t need to be taxing us more… they need to learn how to be lean and efficient and actually spend less. Cut the pork and quit giving blank checks to everyone who walks up asking for a handout. The days of big spending are coming to an end… and frankly I don’t think Americans can stand to be taxed much further.

Also… couldn’t the whole GPS tracking system be defeated by simply parking your car elsewhere and carrying a 5-gal can up to the pump to get gas?

FU Ted. Why not just tax the electricity that electric cars use. And keep the gas tax.
Or why not just fund the roads another way, like an oxygen or water tax. Anyone using oxygen or water in OREGON will get a bill.

Thunderchicken- And who’s paying for the programs for our lost cats, ridiculous brick streets being laid, petty legal cases, unregulated government spending and support ridiculous housing programs such as HUD (I just mentioned a few I’ve had experiences or nearby with).

My point is, I don’t mind paying taxes for our roads. I don’t mind paying taxes to enforce the law, and some social support programs. But otherwise, all of those programs, such as the Botanical Gardens, and even programs such as The Enviromental Protection Agency. To me, such programs should be run under private organizations, or a social group/commonwealth.

And most of the time, you don’t see any results from these programs. For example, under the Enviromental Protection Agency, they make sure little cars don’t pollute too much, and that people aren’t dumping stuff in a river; however, they have no problems with large corporations putting out millions of times more pollutants than our modern cars. I would have no problem if they went after both small and large problems, so there’s no reason for you to say I don’t support them regulating smaller sources such as my car and larger ones. Either way though, I believe it shouldn’t be run by the government.

The reason being, there’s a difference between society and the government. Government should be there to regulate laws and rules, as well as starting/regulating some initiatives for necessities such as roads and sewage that couldn’t otherwise be directed by society. Society on the other hand should be there for things such as my lost cat and laying bricks where the government has already built roads.

One last thing though; I’ve already paid for the roads. I don’t want to start paying the government for my oil. Simple as that. Going to the government with certain things, such as this, always brings some over reaction. Either over reaction, or no reaction at all.

Booth-free automated toll roads…do it for every freeway in Oregon. That’s the best solution.

RaineMan: We try to be “green” and conservative in times of crisis, just like we were asked to do, and crap like this is how we are rewarded!

Crap like this is the reason we’re asked to be green in the first place. We need to all realize this and vote people like this out.

PROTIP: If someone is asking you to feel guilty about something (anything green) or consider a problem that doesn’t exist (this issue) they are NOT smarter than you- they want something from you.

Also, track me via GPS? FU.

Also, what happens when I drive my Oregon car cross country and I come back and get dinged for 3,000 miles when I fill up? File a formal adjustment request to the DOT? Again, FU.

Also, who pays to fit my car with that crap? Lemme guess… me? FU.

Also, Florida has Sun Pass. Google it if you don’t know about it. WTF is wrong with that if there is an absolute need for alternate income to maintain the roads that, and this is important, cannot be filled by cutting expense spending elsewhere?

Also, “As Oregonians drive less…” that means less wear on roads especially with the damn studded tires people use 1/2 the year up there, therefore less maintenance, so what’s the point again? Oh, more taxes, right. My bad.

Geezus H Fking Christ.
Somebody fire this Friggin Governor before he starts taxing butt wipe. My God, is there any sanity anymore? Lets spend another 40 million dollars and shove a chip up our ass to monitor our bowel movements. I mean …..we’re losing a lot of revenue each time the toilet flushes, and who knows who long we can survive on the decreasing revenues of fewer people flushing in these economic times!
For Christs sake people, call your local reps, email them, protest at the capital and impeach this bloody moron!!!