[T]he state needs at least $25 million a year for the next 20 years to reduce phosphorus pollution in Lake Champlain, and legislators are looking at ways to raise the money.
A bill taking shape in the House pieces together several dozen revenue fees and taxes ranging from vehicle sales to diesel and gasoline sales taxes, to fertilizer fees, to a bump in the rooms tax and an occupancy surcharge, to a tax on limousine services.
The legislation originates in the House Committee on Natural Resources, Fish and Wildlife, which is chaired by Rep. David Deen, D-Putney, who has for years sought to fund pollution control efforts for Lake Champlain.
Among the bill’s major items:
- An existing 0.2 percent property-transfer tax brings in around $5 million each year, all of it devoted to improving the state’s water quality. These monies currently make up the state’s Clean Water Fund. This tax expires in the summer of 2018. The bill repeals the sunset provision and preserves the property transfer tax.
- A 50 cent per ton fee on agricultural fertilizer would be hiked to $25 per ton. This would raise $930,000 each year: 98 percent of that would go toward the Clean Water Fund, 2 percent would cover administrative costs.
- A 1 cent increase in the gas tax and the diesel tax (both of them currently around 50 cents per gallon) would raise $3.7 million a year. The bill would send that money to municipalities for stormwater management projects on local roads.
- A $5 per night room-occupancy surcharge would generate $18 million annually. The bill would allocate the money to the Clean Water Fund
- A 1 percent increase in rooms, meals and alcohol taxes (currently 9 percent, 9 percent and 10 percent, respectively) would bring in $19 million each year. The bill as currently written would put 5 percent of the money into the state’s Clean Water Fund. The rest would go to the general fund.
State Treasurer Beth Pearce said earlier this year that for the next two years, existing revenue sources could cover the annual $25 million to $30 million cost to meet federal pollution-reduction requirements for Lake Champlain.
Legislators will need to come up with a longer-term solution by the end of that period, she said.
Pearce has recommended a per-parcel fee to raise money for the federally mandated cleanup, which is expected to cost $2.3 billion — most of that private investment — over the next 20 years.
Clean-water advocates say Lake Champlain can’t wait.
“It’s easy for people in Montpelier, telling everybody to be patient, because they’re not dealing with this poison in their water,” said James Ehlers, of Lake Champlain International.
Ehlers said that if legislators want a simple fix that mirrors the “all-in approach” state officials have urged for years, they should tax every Vermonter a dollar a week, which would bring in $32.5 million a year.
Pearce says it will cost $2.3 billion over the next 20 years to adequately reduce phosphorus pollution into Lake Champlain.
The treasurer’s report identified a $62.4 million per year funding gap. Of that, $48.5 million must be invested in cleanup each year under a federal mandate. Another $13.86 million ought to be available for pollution compliance, she said.
Around half of the total is likely to come directly from the state, Pearce said last month. Private, federal, municipal and other sources are expected to cover the rest.
Deen was not immediately available for comment.