Special Session Gas Tax

The dust had barely settled from the I-35W bridge collapse when some elected officials began trying to exploit this terrible tragedy for political gain. Now Governor Pawlenty is being pressured to call a special legislative session to increase the gas tax. And once legislators are back in St. Paul, all bets are off on keeping the agenda limited to the gas tax. Some legislative leaders have already stated they expect to push for additional tax increases besides the gas tax.

The St. Cloud Times got it right in their recent opinion column, concluding that a special session simply does not make sense. Investigations are not even close to pinpointing the cause of the collapse. Without those crucial details, legislators have little clue as to what specifically needs fixing. A smarter strategy — and one less likely to risk wasting tax dollars — is to begin statewide discussions on infrastructure issues likely to be targeted come the start of the 2008 legislative session. ...

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Minnesota
• Majority
• Special
• Session
• Gas
• Tax
• Governor
• Pawlenty