White House disowns plan to tax car mileage

The legislation the White House is distancing itself from calls for
creating a Surface Transportation Revenue Alternatives Office within
the Federal Highway Administration. It would be tasked with creating a
“study framework that defines the functionality of a mileage-based user
fee system and other systems.”

House Transportation Committee Chairman John
Mica (R-Fla.) has indicated that he did not think a tax-per-mile
proposal was politically palatable, but said Congress would have to
look for ways to supplement declining gas tax revenues.
 
Increasingly energy-efficient cars are generating less money, Mica said in a 2009 interview with The West Volusia Beacon in his home state.

“Even an increase in gas taxes now will not solve the problem,” Mica
said. “Every day, the fleet is getting more efficient. They’re
literally driving further and paying less, so the system will collapse.”

But
even before Republicans took control of the House in 2010 on an
anti-government wave, Mica said the tax-per-mile proposal would be a
tough sell to voters.
 
“They’ll be coming with pitchforks up the Capitol steps,” Mica told the newspaper.
 
Mica’s office did not immediately return requests for comment Thursday.

The post first appeared on The Hill’s Transportation Report blog at 12:22 p.m. Thursday.