Don Behm

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

An advisory referendum on the April 4 spring election ballot in Milwaukee County will ask voters if they support a $60 county wheel tax to help pay for bus transit service and road and bridge repairs.

County residents who own vehicles started paying a $30 vehicle registration fee this year, as part of the 2017 budget approved by the County Board.

While no county officials are predicting — at least publicly — that the proposal will gain approval of a majority of county voters, a few elected officials speaking Monday at a panel on the wheel tax suggested it would be difficult politically to approve boosting the fee to $60 in the face of a majority no vote.

County Comptroller Scott Manske, a supporter of the $60 fee, said rejection by voters would leave officials searching for other ways to deal with looming deficits.

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Manske spoke Monday at a panel hosted by the Public Policy Forum at the Italian Conference Center. He was joined by County Executive Chris Abele, Board Chairman Theodore Lipscomb Sr., and County Supervisor Deanna Alexander.

A $30 fee is expected to generate nearly $13.5 million this year, county budget officials said. Those funds are given specific purposes in the 2017 budget and they do not go into a general fund.

The revenue will be divided with $11.5 million going to bus transit operating costs and $2 million to be spent on major transportation projects, such as rehabilitation of county roads and bridges, and development of a bus rapid transit service between downtown Milwaukee and the Milwaukee Regional Medical Center in Wauwatosa.

Abele had proposed a $60 wheel tax beginning this year when he presented his 2017 recommended budget to the County Board.

A vehicle registration fee is the only new revenue source available to the county under state law, Abele and other officials said. On Monday, Abele said he would not give up on a $60 wheel tax in 2018 even if there is a resounding vote against it on April 4.

Budget planners are facing projected deficits — or gaps between revenues and expenses — of between $37.5 million and $54.7 million in 2018, if there are no significant changes in levels of services and no significant boost in revenue, according to budget director Steve Kreklow.

If rejected by voters, Abele said he would work to educate and inform the public about the need for the revenue in the face of declining state shared revenue payments and federal distributions to the county.

Lipscomb said the board approved a spring referendum question on the $60 wheel tax because there was no public discussion about it before Abele released his executive budget last September. In November, the board adopted a $1.1 billion spending plan for 2017 with the first-ever county vehicle registration fee set at $30.

Lipscomb voted for the $30 wheel tax at that time.

Manske, however, had advised the board that revenue from a $60 fee — projected at $27.1 million in its first year — would be needed "to maintain the county's portion of the local transportation systems, including highways, the bus system and parkways."

Even with a $60 fee starting in 2017, the revenue would not be sufficient to balance transit expenses in just a few years without increases in bus fares or route cuts, Manske said in a report to the board.

Alexander said her constituents on the county's northwest side perceive the county's bus service as wasteful, with large buses running at certain times of day with few passengers, and do not support a wheel tax.

For 2018, the Milwaukee County Transit System is facing a deficit of $3 million, Kreklow said. "Significant transit service reductions," specifically route cuts, would be needed next year if no wheel tax was available, he said.

A $30 county vehicle registration fee is paid in addition to the $75 fee collected by the state. City of Milwaukee vehicle owners also pay a $20 city wheel tax. Vehicle owners in the city this year will pay a combined total of $125 in vehicle registration fees.