Unfamiliar_Word t1_jdaiw0g wrote on March 23, 2023 at 12:19 AM

Reply to comment by ArchaeoJones in But we have roads and they are better than anyone else’s. by eltruteht

>How much of the $4.25 billion that was siphoned off for PSP could have been spent fixing the number of red flagged bridges in this state? You know, like the one in Pittsburgh that collapsed?

I don't know; I'm neither a PennDoT budget analyst nor one of its engineers. I was making a narrow claim contrary to the original post of this thread that the transfer the PSP is not so large that it accounts for most of the tax differential between Pennsylvania and adjacent states.

>If the money is not going to where it's supposed to, we shouldn't be paying it.

At I have pointed out elsewhere, the section of the Commonwealth Constitution that restricts motor vehicle revenues includes highway safety, which would include PSP highway patrols, as among the permissible expenditures and these transfers have been going on for decades. Even if the transfers were abolished, they would need to be made up for by cutting PSP activity, cutting other programs supported by the General Fund to transfer their funding to the PSP or increases in revenue through new or higher fees and taxes.

ArchaeoJones t1_jdamqgt wrote on March 23, 2023 at 12:46 AM

>At I have pointed out elsewhere, the section of the Commonwealth Constitution that restricts motor vehicle revenues
includes highway safety, which would include PSP highway patrols, as
among the permissible expenditures and these transfers have been going
on for decades. Even if the transfers were abolished, they would need
to be made up for by cutting PSP activity, cutting other programs
supported by the General Fund to transfer their funding to the PSP or
increases in revenue through new or higher fees and taxes.

No, it doesn't, and any belief it does is the same as in believing in faeries and unicorns, or just a straight inability to understand the English language.

The PSP was getting a handout from the Motor License Fund because towns were getting rid of their police forces and making PSP pick up the slack.

Unfamiliar_Word t1_jdaonoi wrote on March 23, 2023 at 1:00 AM

>No, it doesn't, and any belief it does is the same as in believing in faeries and unicorns, or just a straight inability to understand the English language.

The restriction of motor vehicle revenues to highway purposes is provided for by Article VIII § 11(a) of the Constitution of Pennsylvania.

This section provides that, "proceeds from gasoline and other motor fuel excise taxes, motor vehicle registration fees and license taxes, operators' license fees and other excise taxes imposed on products used in motor transportation... used solely for construction, reconstruction, maintenance and repair of and safety on public highways and bridges and costs and expenses incident thereto." (Emphasis mine)

Interpreting such funds being available for use to fund public safety as meaning that they may be used for law enforcement patrols on highways, thus transferred to the PSP, is a very reasonable interpretation of that language.

ArchaeoJones t1_jdaq8i4 wrote on March 23, 2023 at 1:11 AM

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess you have no idea what road safety really is.

That's inspections for roads and bridges and safety features like guard rails, electronic signs and plowing and salting.

Unfamiliar_Word t1_jdaubje wrote on March 23, 2023 at 1:41 AM

It is almost certainly also law enforcement activity as ensuring public safety is, no matter how they might often fail to do so, a function of the police.

The earliest Pennsylvania budget that is available online is that for FY 1969 - 1970. On page 237 (345 of the file) in the section regarding the State Police, i shows an estimated expenditure of 25,403 for FY 1968-1969 and there are references to things like them receiving, "a Motor License Fund transfer for traffic patrol activities." So the transfer has been made for at least fifty five years and I would bet that it could be shown to go back as far as the creation of the Motor License fund in 1946 if the relevant documents were readily available.

What's more, prior to the current Pennsylvania State Police, there was briefly a separate Highway Patrol within the Department of Highways that was later merged with the State Police to form the Pennsylvania Motor Police, which were later renamed back to Pennsylvania State Police. In light of that, it seems plausible to me that the constitutional amendment the created what is now Article VIII § 11(a) was written to include allowance for it to fund, "safety," with the intention of allowing for highway patrol functions to be funded from motor vehicle revenues, in keeping with their past association with the Highway Department.

A more than half-century old precedent of actual practice seems to lend credence as a matter of reality to my reading. Even if I'm wrong, all that means some combination of that the PSP must reduce their activities, other functions of the government must be reduced or new revenues my be raised elsewhere, which might in fact end up just being equivalent to increasing Motor License Fund Revenue sources to compensate for the transfer to the State Police, because no matter what governments pretend, money is still fungible.