Roads bill

(W)hile the plans coming from the House and Senate finance committees aren’t perfect, each is a significant improvement on the long-awaited plan that Gov. Haley unveiled in January that could reasonably be described as an effort to cut an extraordinary amount of state taxes while raising a relatively small amount for state roads. Gov. Haley acknowledged the need to increase the gas tax to improve state roads, but she married her plan with a whopping decrease in the state’s income tax.

An agreement to support an increase in the gas tax essentially was used as leverage by the governor to try to gain a reduction in the state income tax from the top rate of 7 percent to 5 percent over 10 years. If enacted into law, the governor’s plan would blow a hole in the state budget. …