Iowa GOP Proposes Gax Tax For Rural Roads

Des Moines Register:

A call for a gas tax increase is one of the proposed new planks in the Republican Party of Iowa's platform - a stance that would represent a major shift if it's adopted next month.
The current state platform says: "We oppose any increase in fuel taxes."
The Des Moines Register obtained a copy of the proposed new one, which says: "We support a fuel tax increase solely allocated to the Rural Road Fund."
The proposal likely reflects Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad's influence in a GOP power struggle within Iowa. The tentative state platform was crafted by the 16 Republican activists elected to the state platform committee. They met on May 10 to review the planks submitted from the four districts. The document faces a vote at the state convention on June 14.
State transportation officials have warned that Iowa has been falling behind by about $215 million annually to meet the most critical needs on Iowa's road system.
But the gas tax has created friction within the GOP. When Branstad said earlier this year that he wouldn't veto a 10-cents-per-gallon gas tax hike that appeared to be gaining momentum in the GOP-led Iowa House, then-Iowa GOP Chairman A.J. Spiker led the public opposition.
The 10-cent hike eventually failed, as did an alternative plan that would have imposed a 5 percent wholesale tax on gasoline.

The article goes on to say that the proposed change may be linked to an effort by establishment Republicans to oust Tea Party-types in recent caucuses.  I'm always in favor of investment in infrastructure, and I'll admit I don't understand Iowa's road funding system, but from the outside this looks like another move by the Republican party to help their own members at the expense of everyone else.  I base that on the fact the increase is solely allocated to the Rural Road Fund.  Because of that wording, I see urban and suburban Iowans paying for roads in low population areas where the local residents can't afford to maintain their own roads.

That may not be the case, but I think it highlights the danger the GOP faces in constantly framing things as us-versus-them in an effort to cling to power with a shrinking base of mainly white, rural, religious and old voters in a growing population of young, non-white, less religious urban and suburban residents.  Rural life has long been by necessity subsidized, because the low population density makes the infrastructure required in modern life, whether in school funding, electric distribution, road network or other systems such as broadband, unaffordable in relation to urban and suburban areas.  Rural voters refusing to support taxes unless that money goes exclusively to them at the expense of other citizens may lead to a serious backlash amongst suburban and urban voters.  Rural areas have a lot to lose if subsidies to life in low-population areas are cut.

Hopefully, the Rural Road Fund is much more broad than the name implies, and rural support for infrastructure investment is more broad than only supporting a tax measure if it benefits themselves at the expense of everyone else.  My experience in talking to rural folks, on the other hand, wouldn't indicate that is the case.  What's even worse is that the Tea Party types had to be thrown out to even consider this proposal.  Damn, what a mess.