The Connecticut legislature’s Finance, Revenue, and Bonding Committee recently nixed Governor Rell’s proposal to slowly increase the state’s gas tax and instead approved a gradual increase of the petroleum products tax. The latter will be largely passed on to motor fuel consumers, but it may have less immediate political consequences than directly raising the state’s take at the gas pump. The Committee’s plan will provide a comparable amount of funding for transportation improvements over the next 11 years.

Rell’s $1.3 billion transportation improvement plan relied on raising the gas tax six cents per gallon over eight years and adding a $1 surcharge on all tickets on the New Haven line starting in 2008. It would pay for 342 new rail cars over the next ten years and improvements to Interstate 95, among other things. The Finance, Revenue, and Bonding committee did not alter this proposal, or funds slated for various portions of I-95. However, the committee did re-direct $150 million the governor had slated for I-84 and I-91 to a list of projects the state’s Transportation Strategy Board had issued earlier. It was not immediately clear which projects would receive funding, since the strategy board has generally adopted a "more of everything" approach to state transportation needs.

The committee also dropped Rell’s plan to speed up rail car purchases by exempting them from the state’s bidding process, arguing that it would set a bad precedent for future bids. The bill will now be submitted to the Senate. Legislators will approve the state’s budget in the beginning of June.

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