LIHUE — A proposal to lower the county fuel tax and motor vehicle weight tax rates is on the agenda for Wednesday’s County Council meeting, set for 8:30 a.m. at the Historic County Building.
LIHUE — A proposal to lower the county fuel tax and motor vehicle weight tax rates is on the agenda for Wednesday’s County Council meeting, set for 8:30 a.m. at the Historic County Building.
The tax decrease, proposed by Councilman Derek Kawakami, is in response to the recent half percent increase of the General Excise Tax approved by the council effective January 2019.
“We have just increased our GET for transportation and road construction,” Kawakami said. “This decrease is aimed to provide some relief to our local residents who rely on their vehicles to get to and from work.”
The current vehicle weight tax is 2 cents per pound. The proposed change would drop the tax to 1 cent per pound beginning in January 2019.
The county fuel tax is 17 cents a gallon. The proposal would reduce the tax to 13 cents while the GET hike is in effect, then back to 17 cents when the tax increase expires.
How many cars on the island? The tax will probably affect cars bought or time on the roads. It’s a tax that affects car owners as well as the dealership car businesses. They’ll have to wait and see the effects from it.
It is hard to predict the economic indicators too. More or less visitors on the island could mean more or less people driving on the roads. The arrivals of visitors is one could indicator. What to expect next year?
This is the way I view politics on Kaua’i. If you grew up playing high school sports and failed also, meaning no walk or paper, you’re one of them backing up Bernard p. CARVALHO & Ross Kagawa. They just played baseball and football. Not politics and solving problems. Statistics hold true in judging these candidates who ran for council.
Derek….. What should have taken place is the excise tax should have been raised a full 1to2%in order to quickly create the income we need. Next, during that time take away all tax on food, clothing, and medicine. These are the basic essentials that all people regardless of their financial status must purchase as basic needs. The same for medical marijuana. No tax. When the legislators finally pull their heads out of the sand and legalize recreational marijuana then tax it 20% and the
Revenue created will be enough to lower the excise tax back to
4.167%.
Why in the world is the tax based on the weight of the vehicle? If you taxed based on the value of the vehicle, it makes sense. This way, the guy with the brand new Tesla isn’t paying less than the poor family with the huge 20 year old family van. Come on Kaua’i, it ain’t rocket science.
Get it together… Heavy vehicles don’t do our roads any justice. The high cost of maintenance is a result of to much heavy vehicles. Therefore it makes sense to the individual in charge of making more government rules. Local thinking….. If we make the fees high on the family with the old tank of a van, then maybe the family will sell it and pay less fees on a much lighter vehicle. Now don’t hold me to all of this. This is generally how Hawaii government thinks.
If it wasn’t for the popularity contests at election time who knows maybe someone elected will begin to see the stupidity of how things that just don’t make sense