NFIB Victories in Michigan!
After more than three years of effort and controversy, the Michigan Legislature passed a road funding plan on November 4, 2015. The $1.2 billion plan is a 50/50 mix of $600 million in new revenue in the form of pump tax and registration fee increases and $600 million in future earmarks of the state’s general fund revenue.
While the plan still increases registration fees and fuel prices at the pump, it is a far cry from the original proposals that sought to more than double registration fees and the pump tax on fuel. NFIB was the only business group that opposed efforts to raise more than $1.6 billion in road funding through tax hikes and registration fees alone. While these tax increases are disappointing, lawmakers did listen to the concerns of small business and NFIB and the plan they passed dedicated a substantial portion of future general fund revenue to road construction and maintenance in order to avoid funding the roads with hikes in the gas tax and vehicle registration alone.