(The Center Square) – The Richland City Council unanimously passed a one-tenth of 1% sales tax hike on Tuesday, without voter approval, to replace a $20 car tab fee funding its pavement preservation program.
Finance Director Brandon Allen said Richland will begin collecting the tax revenue in April. The officials initially approved it last month, but voted again due to issues reporting the change to the state. Both the Department of Revenue and the Department of Licensing operate on different notification deadlines.
The money will fund the city’s Transportation Benefit District. State law allows cities to establish TBDs to fund local infrastructure projects by either passing a tax increase or a licensing fee. The council can pass either option without voter approval, but requires their consent to increase either in the future.
“We were sort of rushing,” Councilmember Jhoanna Jones said Tuesday, referencing the plan to initially start collection by January 2026. “So, I like this idea better, that we’re actually being more methodical about the process, basically avoiding the rushing … to meet deadlines that sometimes are difficult.”
The council unanimously approved the creation of the city’s TBD in 2017 to help pay for a $38 million bridge largely funded by the state. Only residents pay the $20 car tab fee, which generates about $1 million annually, compared to the sales tax, which all consumers would pay to generate $2.25 million.
The .01% increase only costs a penny for every $10 spent at the register but raises the total rate to 8.8% after other state and local sales taxes. When the idea came up in September, City Manager Jon Amundson said you would have to spend $20,000 in one year to raise the equivalent of one $20 car tab.
“My brain wants to vote yes, my heart wants to vote no because I do not like taxes,” Mayor Pro Tem Sandra Kent said, “but the math says … this is going to be less expensive than the current tab fee.”
Kent was on the council when it established the TBD, and said Thursday that part of her still believes that road maintenance should be part of the city’s core services and budgeted for with existing funds.
She voted in favor of the car tab fee in 2017 because an engineer said a TBD was a way to ensure the city adequately preserved the roads since the city didn’t have enough money for it otherwise. That played into Kent’s decision again on Thursday, though she cited a desire to cut taxes if possible in the future.
The city of Pasco, one of Richland’s neighbors in Tri-Cities, is also considering establishing a TBD. The topic came up during the Pasco City Council’s meeting on Monday. The officials favored the sales tax over the car tab fee, as in Richland, but the dais ultimately signaled that it should be left to voters.
Richland Councilmember Kurt Maier said Tuesday that he is “unreservedly in favor of this change.”
He said that up until now, only city residents had shouldered the cost of pavement preservation, but this shift requires anyone coming through or working in town to pay for that. Maier joined Jones and Councilmember Ryan Lukson in thanking city staff for working on a quick timeline despite hiccups.
“To be fair to staff,” Lukson said, “had we given more time to do the due diligence and go through the process, it wouldn’t have been an issue. So in some ways, it feels like no good deed goes unpunished.”
