By Keith M. Phaneuf
Majority Democrats proposed a one-year cap today on the state’s escalating wholesale fuel tax—but set it to expire one day before one of the largest fuel tax increases in state history is set to kick in.
Democratic leaders in the House and Senate pledged to consider extending the cap beyond June 2013, but said they could not commit to one given uncertainties about the state budget. But the budget Gov. Dannel P. Malloy proposed in February for 2012-13 faces a major deficit—based on the administration’s own numbers—one year later, the same time that state fuel taxes would climb dramatically.
Republican legislative leaders, who have been advocating a cap on the state’s most volatile levy on gasoline for several months, agreed to support the proposal, but criticized Democrats for including an expiration date.
At New Haven harbor, the single-largest fuel importing site in Connecticut, the wholesale price of gasoline stood today at $3.18 per gallon, according to the Independent Connecticut Petroleum Association. The Democrats’ proposal would calculate the tax based on an artificial ceiling of $3 per gallon whenever the actual wholesale price rises above that mark.
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