Corbett: Fuel-tax increase will help rural Iowa

CEDAR RAPIDS - Mayor Ron Corbett on Monday said the state of Iowa should increase its tax on fuel by a minimum of 10 cents a gallon to benefit rural Iowa, by better connecting it to the state's urban jobs.

Corbett said the state of Iowa receives the largest percentage of revenue from the state road-use tax fund, and a 10-cent increase in the state fuel tax will provide additional revenue to complete the widening of highways like Highway 20 and Highway 30 from two to four lanes. Such improvements will make it easier for small-town and rural residents to get to work in cities like Cedar Rapids, he said.

'Although cities like Cedar Rapids will get some additional revenue (from a fuel-tax increase), this is more about the state and connecting rural Iowa,” Corbett said.

He said some 1,000 grain trucks a day come from rural Iowa into Cedar Rapids to feed the grain-processing industries in the city.

'Cedar Rapids needs rural Iowa to be successful,” he said.

Corbett, who is past president of the Cedar Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce, said smaller cities in Jones and Benton counties have benefitted from the widening of Highway 151 and a section of Highway 30.

He said the Cedar Rapids metro area views towns like Anamosa and Monticello in Jones County as part of the metro area 'laborshed,” because highway improvements have connected these 'collar” towns around Cedar Rapids to the metro area's jobs. Additional highway improvements can connect a second tier of towns to Cedar Rapids as they can connect towns to other Iowa metro areas, he said.

'People can live in rural and small-town Iowa and still have access to jobs in the bigger cities. They can get up and make it to work in 35 to 40 minutes,” he said.

Corbett said he also would like to see the Iowa Department of Transportation use its share of any increase in revenue in the road-use tax fund to widen Interstate 380 to six lanes from the Cedar Rapids metro area to Interstate 80.

For some years, major cities in Iowa have said that the distribution formula for the state's road-use tax fund needs to change to direct more of the fund's revenue to cities where most of the state's people live.

Corbett said cities can live with the current formula so as not to jeopardize the chance in the upcoming legislative session to get an increase if the state fuel tax put in place.

Corbett, a one-time speaker of the Iowa House, said it will take a 'fragile coalition” of urban and rural legislators to win a fuel-tax increase. He said insisting on a change in the disbursement formula 'would muck up the works too much” and hurt the chance of the increase being approved.

Corbett said the state fuel tax is bringing in less revenue than it had because vehicles today are more fuel efficient. In 2008, one penny in state fuel tax generated $23 million a year, and six years later, one penny brings in $19 million, he said.

The current state tax is 21 cents a gallon for non-ethanol gasoline and 19 cents a gallon for ethanol-blended gasoline, according to the IDOT.

Corbett said the state increased fees on car and truck licenses in recent years to bring in additional state revenue for road improvements, but only Iowans have paid that money. Out-of-state users of Iowa's roads also pay when the Iowa fuel tax is increased, he said.

Corbett said a 10-cent increase in the state fuel tax would bring Cedar Rapids about $3 million more a year.

The the Metropolitan Coalition of Iowa's 10 largest cities, of which Cedar Rapids is a member, supports the call for an increase in the state fuel tax, he said.