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Lane County Will Tweak Vehicle Fee Proposal

Lane County

The Lane County Board of Commissioners has postponed a decision on whether to put a $35 annual vehicle registration fee on the May ballot. The fee would fund repair to roads and bridges.

The board heard from 20 people at a hearing Tuesday. Nancy Nichols of Deadwood was among those in favor of the fee. She lives near a gravel road.

Nichols: "During the summer, choking dust clouds rise up behind every vehicle, making walking or bicycling on the road unhealthy. Some days, especially if there is heavy equipment traveling back and forth to the national forest the air is so bad it is difficult to be outside our homes."

John Nagy of Springfield was against the fee.

Nagy: "The government tells me that my social security only goes up 3 percent a year. So all of a sudden, you guys want to tack in almost 100 percent on my license fees. I have 4 vehicles. At any given time only one is on the road."

Commissioners want to make some tweaks to the vehicle fee proposal. One would require the county to use revenue from the fee only for road and bridge maintenance, not new construction. The other would clarify that the funds can't be used for sheriff's patrols.
 

Rachael McDonald is KLCC’s host for All Things Considered on weekday afternoons. She also is the editor of the KLCC Extra, the daily digital newspaper. Rachael has a BA in English from the University of Oregon. She started out in public radio as a newsroom volunteer at KLCC in 2000.
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