EDITOR:
What a crock! The Nevada Department of Transportation plan to raise money for public roads by taxing for mileage driven is a terrible idea. If they need more money to pay for maintaining public roads, that additional money is going to come from us, the taxpayers, no matter what they call it.
Keeping track of how many miles each of us drives will add to the bureaucracy and possibly add to the cost of vehicles by putting a GPS into each vehicle allowing the government to automatically track where we drive (big time yuck). The result is that some of the additional taxes will go to increasing the bureaucracy and less will go to the purpose of the tax, i.e., the roads.
Taxing for miles driven also punishes people who choose to buy small, fuel-efficient, light vehicles, which do very little damage to the roads.
The beneficiaries are the people who choose to buy big, fuel-inefficient, heavy vehicles (and of course the trucking industry) whose asphalt-crushing behemoths cause much more damage to the roads.
Nobody likes to pay taxes, but the fuel tax is one of the best and fairest taxes there is, and the best solution is to bite the damn bullet and raise fuel taxes so they generate sufficient money to adequately fund the public roads. The bureaucracy to collect this tax already exists so more of our money will go to the roads.
Don Southwick
Jacks Valley
