Specifics needed on gas-tax idea

It's hard to predict the costs and benefits of a proposed Flathead County gas tax, and therefore it's hard to get behind the idea that's being considered by county and city governments.

The county commissioners started the ball rolling on this proposal, and are asking the various city councils to decide whether it is worth pursuing. But the only thing clear so far is that if the tax goes to the ballot in November, there will need to be answers to some important questions for it to have a chance with voters.

The Kalispell City Council this week started considering some of those questions as it looked at the possibibility of a 2 cents per gallon tax. For starters, no one knows just how much revenue the tax would generate, although Kalispell City Manager Jim Patrick ventured a guess that it might be in the neighborhood of $1 million, countywide.

That makes sense since a major purpose of the tax is to replace the loss of about $900,000 that went to the county's road budget from a federal program that expired this year.

But what if the calculated revenue estimate turns out to be $2 million or $3 million. Maybe the tax should be just 1 cent per gallon. Or what if 2 cents per gallon raises just half of what's needed?

The revenue would apparently be divvied up among the county, Kalispell, Whitefish and Columbia Falls. Voters need to know exactly how the revenue sharing would work, and exactly what the revenue would be dedicated to in each governing jurisdiction.

Presumably, the money would go toward roads, and it's well known that Flathead County has road problems, particularly dust problems on unpaved roads. But does Whitefish, with its existing resort tax, need the money for roads? It needs to be clear how the money would be used by city and county governments.

Bob Hafferman is the only Kalispell City Council member to express outright opposition to the tax so far, and he makes a good point: Flathead County citizens should not be so willing to cough up revenue that has long been provided by the federal government.

The U.S. Forest Service paid counties 25 percent of timber receipts and other revenue going back decades because of an understanding that national forest lands occupied huge blocks of land, mostly in western counties, that would otherwise be taxable if it were private property.

But timber sales dropped off sharply in the 1990s, and so did the once reliable 25 percent revenue. So Congress passed the Rural Schools and Community Act of 2000 as a temporary alternative that lasted just seven years, expiring this year. The federal government shouldn't be let off the hook so easily after such a long-standing relationship with timber counties.

But in the meantime, the gas tax is something to consider, with some revenue surely coming from passing tourists. If it gets to the ballot in November, it will at least be an opportunity for voters to express just how important they consider local road issues to be.