JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – With the local gas tax set to double in Jacksonville next month, there is a push by one City Council member to stop it.
And another City Council member now wants to delay it for six months.
The local option gas tax increase was approved in May. The new gas tax could raise over $960 million in the next 30 years. That money will be used for transportation and other projects.
Even though the price of gas appears to be dropping somewhat, motorists like Daryl Thompson are not keen on seeing the local tax double -- going from 6 cents a gallon to 12 cents.
“I mean, I think it’s a little ridiculous at the times we’ve got right now,” Thompson said.
That is why City Councilwoman LeAnna Cumber is introducing legislation to put the brakes on the tax. She says the new tax is more painful for those who can least afford it. The tax could cost drivers an additional $14 to $36 a year.
“We should have never had doubled our gas tax back in May,” Cumber said.
Cumber says the nearly $1 billion that the tax is supposed to raise over 30 years will be spent on many unnecessary or wasteful projects like the Skyway, which she says nobody uses.
“It’s like we are getting a new credit card. We are maxing it out,” Cumber said.
Cumber says that if there is a real emergency in the years to come and we need to raise the gas tax, the city won’t be able to do it. Plus, she says, the feds are supposed to be sending money to us from the president’s trillion-dollar transportation plan.
City Councilman Garrett Dennis is also introducing legislation that will take a different approach. It follows the path of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who wants to suspend the state gas tax for a short term.
“My proposal is to have a moratorium for six months for the six cents gas tax basically paralleling with the governor has proposed for the state,” Dennis said.
City Councilman Matt Carlucci believes the idea of blocking the new tax is ridiculous.
“It’s a bad idea, and it’s a very political idea. The problem is we would be giving up a sure thing for something that we don’t know that we’re really going to get from the feds,” Carlucci said.
News4JAX reached out to Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry, but his staff says they will hold off on commenting.
For now, the local gas tax is still set to go into effect Jan. 1.