They should sell shirts with a picture of a sheep on it, saying “I got fleeced in Florida”.

Disney’s free “Magical Express” is having a MAJOR impact on the car rental industry in Orlando. That decrease in rental has obviously taken its toll in the taxes collected also.

In 2005, Republicn Governor Romney gutted the Tool Road Authority’s reserve fund, normally used excusively for the Tool Road Maintenance; to help “balance” the General Fund. More or less the same thing Bill Clinton did when he robber the Social Security Trust Fund to “balance” the Federal Budget.

The problem, is the voters being dumb enough to keep reelecting these bozos.

Bob

Actually, people renting a car in South Florida will get some benefit from the $2 fee. There are three major airports in South Florida (W. Palm Beach, Ft. Lauderdale and Miami). Two of the airports are adjacent to I-95 and the third is just a few miles away. Most visitors renting a car will use I-95 sometime during their stay. Tri-Rail runs parallel to I-95 for almost its entire length. Every passenger riding on Tri-Rail is not using not using his or her car to add to the constant congestion that plagues I-95. Therefore, this $2 fee can be seen as a way of making travel along the I-95 corridor just a bit faster.

As a non-resident of Florida, I had the opportunity of using Tri Rail just yesterday to make a transfer from FLL to MIA. (I flew into FLL on a low-cost carrier, as drastic schedule reductions had made travel directly into MIA not an option.) If you are not on a tight schedule, Tri Rail is the way to go. I could not believe that my husband and I were able to make this transfer for $3/person. Taxi fare would have been $70, and a one-day rental car including all taxes and fees was around $65. The connection took around 2-hours because our train was delayed by 40 minutes, but it was simple to use: shuttle bus to the FLL/Dania Beach station, Tri-Rail to MIA station, shuttle bus to MIA terminals.

Having used public transportation in many of the locations I have traveled to, I did not feel that it would have been unreasonable to pay double the rate. Heck- for me it would still have been a bargain for $10/person.

I think many people are out-of-touch with the reality of what it costs to operate services like Tri Rail. We are in an era where everybody wants to pay less for more and pretty much expects something for nothing. That reasoning cannot continue if we do not want to see valuable public services fail.

I drive a big SUV. My SUV is heavy and uses a lot of gas and stresses the road and environment more than a Pruis. Consequently, I pay alot more gasoline taxes than the Prius owner. I’m happy with that. I made a choice and I am paying for that choice in terms of a proportionately greater amount of gas taxes.

That is simply unfair.

I’m all for encouraging people to use public transportation, and in some cities it is definitely the absolute BEST alternative all the way around, so I could see a reasonable argument that a tax on rental cars would encourage people to use public transportation, but not in this case.

Tourists are driving because there is no other option. Driving is not a right, but it is a forced requirement in South Florida. I happily go to many places – NYC, Boston and most of Europe – with good mass transit and love to be without my car. My commuting to NYC was filled with a daily newspaper, reading many books and a hand knit sweater each month because I rode the train. I know from my brother in law that the Sarasota area is filled with way too many snow birds and their cars as well as other tourists. But who is paying all these taxes and costs to supplement the residents’ tax payments, if not the tourists? Be careful what you wish for, I do no tlike the heat and certainly have stayed away, but many others may as well.

When a particular service benefits the population at large, the population at large should pay for it. Whether that’s by a sales tax, an income tax, or a property tax is a decision each jurisdiction must decide for itself. Sales taxes fall heavier on lower income residents and on visitors. Income taxes fall heavier on higher-income residents. Property taxes in theory fall on all, but due to convoluted property exemptions for homesteads and special exemptions for investment in industry, these tend to fall harder on small businesses (which don’t qualify for the business incentives) and renters (who pay the property tax assessed on their residences through rent, with no homestead exemption to reduce the impact). Everyone uses roads and streets in some fashion, whether it’s to drive on, bike on, ride a bus on, or whatever. Everyone benefits from an educated population. And if mass transit reduces congestion on roads, then yes, everyone should pay for it – not just people who rent cars.

However, when a service benefits only a limited few, then a tax or fee levied on those who benefit should pay for the service. It’s reasonable to assess a fee on rental cars to pay for a rental-car facility at the airport. It’s possibly reasonable to assess a fee on rental cars to help improve the roads at the airport, even though a good many airport customers won’t rent cars but will benefit from the roads. It’s also possible such a fee is unreasonable – it comes down to deciding whether the benefits accrue significantly to the assessed group.

But if a mass transit project only covers one corridor/route, as seems to be the case here, its benefit will be primarily to the users of the highway in that corridor – the vast majority of whom are likely local residents. This one isn’t even close: only a tiny percentage of car renters are likely to benefit at all, but they’d be bearing 100% of the cost. This is, as has been pointed out, one classic way politicians get funding for a project that can’t garner enough public support through a broader-based tax: sticking it to the group that isn’t represented at the bargaining table.

IIRC Las Vegas either did or was going to enact a rental car tax something like 2 or 3 years ago. It even went to far as to target tourists specifically because it allowed for an exemption from the tax if the renter showed a valid NV id. The tax was for a VERY large amount too and would have raised many millions a year.