The Centre County Board of Commissioners approved on Tuesday an additional $5 vehicle registration fee for county residents with non-exempt vehicles.
The ordinance establishing the fee passed in a 2-1 vote, with commissioners Mark Higgins and Michael Pipe voting in favor and Steve Dershem voting against.
Funds raised by the fee will be used for bridge and transportation projects in the county. Pipe said the fee will generate $596,100 in revenue. In the past 10 years, there has been an average funding gap of $735,000 annually for liquid fuels funds requests to the board from local municipalities. The county also will be eligible for up to $2 million in state matching funds for enacting the ordinance, which will go into effect no sooner than 90 days from when PennDOT is notified.
Approximately 6,000 vehicles in the county are exempt and not subject to the fee. About 1,317 retirees who are eligible for the flat $10 state registration fee also will not have to pay the additional fee. About 119,000 vehicles will be subject to the fee.
Act 89 of 2013 allows counties to impose the fee. No administrative costs are included in the fee and all money is returned to the county to be allocated to municipalities. Payments will occur in December and June each year.
A sunset clause is included in the ordinance. In 2022, the board will have the option to vote to continue the fee for another five years.
Pipe said that among the needs for county municipalities is addressing 13 bridges 20 feet in length or greater that were determined to be deficient.
Higgins noted that flooding last fall washed away two parts of Purdue Mountain Road. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has offered to pay 75 percent of the repair costs, but a 25 percent local match totaling about $300,000 is required. That money was expected to come from the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, but, Higgins said, the proposed budget from the state house cuts PEMA funding and would eliminate that matching money.
‘We will need the $5 registration fee to provide this local match money,’ Higgins said. ‘The PA house budget slashes funding so deeply I feel we have no choice.’
Dershem said part of the reason he was voting against the ordinance was that the county itself does not own any bridges or roads.
‘I don’ think this is part of our mission,’ he said. ‘If we had roads and bridges maybe it would be.’
He also said a state budget has not yet been finalized.
‘It’s a little early to figure what is being cut from the state budget,’ Dershem said. ‘I understand the concern.’
The process of developing the fee ordinance began earlier this year. Of 19 municipalities surveyed, 12 were in favor of the measure. They included including Boggs, College, Gregg, Patton, Potter and Spring townships, and Centre Hall, Milesburg, Millheim, Snow Shoe, State College and Unionville boroughs. Haines, Halfmoon, Harris, Penn and Snow Shoe townships and Bellefonte Boroughs were not in favor of the fee. Ferguson Township the decision was for the commissioners to make and would support however they chose to proceed.
Pipe also led three town hall forums to explain the fee and receive public input.
A website will be established to show how much money is collected from the fee and how it is allocated.
