Rep. Halbrook urges opposition to a possible gas tax hike

For Immediate Release                                                                                      Contact: Brad Halbrook

Dec. 17, 2018                                                                                                                        217-774-1306 

Shelbyville, IL – With the possibility of legislators being asked to vote on a gas tax increase during the upcoming lame duck session of the Legislature, State Representative Brad Halbrook is urging opposition to any tax hike proposal.

“We do not need a repeat of what happened in 2011 when the Democrat majority pushed through a massive income tax increase during the lame duck session as dozens of lawmakers who were leaving office the next day cast votes to raise taxes,” Halbrook said. “That vote occurred in the middle of the night while most people were asleep. There was strong opposition to how that tax increase became law. We should not go down that road again.”

There have been several ideas floated to raise the gas tax in Illinois. The most recent proposal from Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is to raise the gas tax 20 – 30 cents in Illinois. The average tax on motor fuel in Illinois is 37.32 cents per gallon. Raising the tax by 30 cents per gallon would mean Illinois would have the highest gas in the nation at 67.32 cents per gallon – nearly 9 cents higher than the 58.7 cents per gallon tax in Pennsylvania.

Halbrook said what is needed is a comprehensive approach to transportation – not a knee jerk reaction to raise taxes just because gas prices are low.

“The political battles between Gov. Rauner and Speaker Madigan has made it impossible to get a Capital bill done and so we have not done any major road improvement plans in a very long time,” Halbrook said. “But we do not need to sneak tax increases through in the middle of the night and allow lame duck legislators to set major policies for the state. We need to take a comprehensive approach to transportation funding and we also need to see what is going to happen at the federal level as Democrats and Republicans both are wanting a major transportation funding initiative. We should wait and see what happens at the federal level before raising taxes here in Illinois.”

For more information, log onto www.rephalbrook.com/.

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