No Extra Gas Tax for County

The bid to add an additional five cents gas tax in Gulf County was defeated Monday night at the county commission meeting.

A super majority (four of the five votes) was needed to implement the additional gas tax. But after lengthy discussion, commission chair Nathan Peters voted against the tax, joining with Commissioner Bill Williams. That made the vote three to two, and the motion was defeated.

Commissioners Warren Yeager, Carmen McLemore and Billy Traylor voted to implement the tax.

The motion to re-assess the existing six cents gas tax passed unanimously. That tax has been in place about 20 years already, according to county attorney Tim McFarland, and will continue for an additional 10 years. It pays for the county road bond.

The additional five cents tax was to cover the $1 million insurance bill required by the bond holders, a cost of approximately $200,000 each year for the next five years.

The bill was triggered by a clause in the bond agreement that stated if the bond's rating dropped, the county would be required to deposit just over $99,550 twice a year for five years into the annual debt service account. Due to the national economy, the bond rating recently dropped from AAA to much lower, triggering the requirement.

The additional five cents would yield $200,000 to $240,000 yearly, according to McFarland.

Williams insisted the board could find the additional $200,000 somewhere in the upcoming budget, even if it meant cutting services. The other commissioners were not as sure, with Yeager emphasizing that if the tax was not passed, the board would have to use ad valorem dollars to pay the bill.

Since there was a July 1 deadline for levying the tax, the commission had to make the decision Monday night.

When Peters called for the board's votes, the measure stood at three for passing the tax, one against. After a long pause, Peters voted against the tax and the measure failed to pass.

In other business conducted at the meeting:

Rosemary Woods, vice president of PBS and J, a Tallahassee-based engineering firm, gave the board an update on the Gulf Coast Parkway.

Her presentation came just six days after two law firms from Tallahassee addressed a packed house in Mexico Beach to talk about eminent domain issues along CR386 regarding the parkway.

Woods showed maps detailing the final four pathways under consideration for the parkway, which will eventually go from the intersection of County 386 and U.S. 98 at the Bay-Gulf County line, up County 386 and across the Wetappo Creek area to SR22 in Bay County.

According to Woods, routes 8, 14, 15 and 17 are the choices from which the final route will be taken, with an option, she said, of mixing and matching the routes.

The final parkway corridor will be 168 feet wide in suburban areas, 250 feet wide in rural areas, she said.

"It is unknown now where the road will be. We have no idea where the impact will occur," Woods told the commission in regards to the eminent domain issue. "It is still early in the process of deciding where the residential and commercial alignments are. It will be over one year before the decision is made on the route," she continued. "We will look at [County] 386 alternates from Mexico Beach and Beacon Hill."

According to Woods, the planning, development and environment study will take at least two years, the design phase about two years, and an additional year for right of way acquisition, so that actual construction will not begin for about five years. There are currently no monies allocated for construction, she said.

When questioned about a new bridge over Wetappo Creek, Woods said they were "definitely looking at a high level bridge crossing Wetappo" because the creek is used as a safe harbor during hurricane evacuation.