VMT
According to an Emerald article Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer introduced legislation that would fund a pilot program. This particular program is called the Vehicle Miles Traveled program.
The article says that this program would have GPS units put into vehicles and then drivers would be taxed for the number of miles that they’d driven (on top of the federal and state gas taxes). Blumenauer is trying to make this a national program.
Guess what state has already tried this program out? You guessed it! Oregon and in the lovely city of Portland. People volunteered to have the state put GPS units in their car and track their in-state mileage.
I realize that in the poorly budgeted state of Oregon more taxes is a good thing for those yokels in Salem but this is getting ridiculous. Oregon needs to hire someone from the private sector to figure their shit out because Kulongoski and his cronies are not doing the job.
A part of me also has a problem with the idea of the Federal or State governments putting tracking devices in my vehicle. Yes, the article in question does state that the study in Portland said that while the mileage would be reported the location of the car would be “undisclosed.” I’m calling shenanigans on the whole thing right now because of the word undisclosed. That word means that they have the location but won’t tell the public…yay? Not a cause for celebration.
I’m very much pro keeping the government out of my life as much as I can and this just seems ridiculously invasive.
Here’s to hoping this fails.
If they really wanted to track mileage, couldn’t they just do it when you get your vehicle inspected? Do they even inspect vehicles here? GPS Units in cars. gross me out while you get a throwback from Garmin.
Something about illegal search and seizure regarding someone’s personal belongings, including monitoring, seems to fit in here.
Is that the 4th Amendment, by perchance?
Sounds like this, which I wrote about some months ago, is unfortunately proceeding apace.
b: The problem with that approach is that it doesn’t take into account miles traveled outside the state of Oregon.
Whats wrong with just checking the odometer? This would be a much simpler alternative: If you have a vehicle registered in the DMV of Oregon, then every year or so you would calculate up your miles traveled (I would assume that you would have your last year’s numbers accessible to you). Then, you take the difference, and find your car tax out of that.
If we were to have a per-mile tax (which sounds absofuckinghorriblelutly), then this would be my recommendation for it. Having GPS locational info (which is completely accessible … that is, after all, the point of having a GPS in your vehicle) be “undisclosed” …. BS. Government has a fetish for paper trails and information … its in their blood.
Its like if you tell your kids: “Now this Christmas, we have hidden the presents in the closet … they are against the back wall, behind the dresses … but don’t look! Do you promise?” “Of course, Mom!”, and then you leave for a week and a half … “Sure, we didn’t peek … we’re honest!”
Obviously having a GPS unit for tracking purposes is a bad idea. But, as I’ve already explained, simply checking the odometer doesn’t work, since it doesn’t take into account miles driven outside of Oregon.
If I drive 200 miles to the state border and then do a 1000+ mile cross-country trip, the odometer will not differentiate between my taxable “Oregon” miles and my non-taxable “everywhere else in the entire country” miles.
That is unless Oregon wants to try to assert some kind of “right” to levy taxes on what I do in other states, which, of course, would be treading on very thin ice.
Yeah, I brought this up at work, and saying it out loud helped me realize the out-of-state mileage issue. Texas has toll roads, and that seems to work quite well. In fact, that’s about the only thing Texas has gotten right.
Vincent, do not forget Oregon gps will be a “pilot project”. Oregon is home of the Orwellian pioneers (nerds). Later the entire nation will be served by this hi tech environmental solution (in search of a problem). Eco-elite Earl proves that the only thing worse than politicians is politicians who ride bikes.
Just make turnpikes already. Roads get improving, people still have the option to take slower, non-turnpike roads and the state gets to reallocate road monies elsewhere as monies collected from turnpikes takes their place.
Done. Plus, it’s better than a tax on Oregonians…everyone gets to play.