|
- |
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY has slipped one over on us. After struggling for two years to come up with a plan to solve Virginia's transportation woes, legislators finally struck a compromise. Alas, part of the new law is an open invitation for the fox to bed down in the hen house--and take a pound of flesh while he's at it.
Government should serve the people. That's the idea behind the American democracy. But government's constant temptation is to make too much of itself. Oppression and a heavy burden of taxation can soon follow.
The transportation package has some good provisions, but one of them is a sleight of hand that's just now coming to light. This provision permits the state to levy civil "remediation fees" for traffic offenses. Designed specifically to fund transportation improvements, these fees (think of them as "court costs," we're told) are simply outrageous.
Beginning July 1, slip up in your driving and you could be facing these hefty charges:
Failure to give proper signal, up to $3,000
Learner's permit violation, up to $900
Driving too fast for conditions,
Operating a motor vehicle with below standard tires, up to $900.
These "fees" are in addition to applicable criminal fines, and they can't be waived by the court. In a nice slap at state taxpayers, the exorbitant add-ons will be levied only against Virginians. Yankees headed south to Florida will get by with "just" a speeding ticket.
House Speaker Bill Howell, R-Stafford, often defends his staunch stand against an increase in the gas tax by suggesting that many Virginians simply cannot afford another dime a gallon for gas. How many can afford three thousand bucks for failing to use a turn signal?
Charitably, the bill allows miscreants to pay in the installment plan, over three years. It doesn't matter: The fees will devastate the young, the poor, the elderly on a meager income--all of whom, like the rest of us, are subject to momentary inattentiveness--in the name of avoiding "raising taxes."
Virginians should be outraged and signal their intentions, all right--by demanding the repeal of a schedule of afflictions that reflects the spirit of the Sheriff of Nottingham a lot more than that of any of our Founders.
