That’s essentially what lawmakers say when they ask us to send them more tax dollars to fix the “crumbling roads and bridges” of Massachusetts. They say it’s up to us to maintain our transportation system because we’re the ones who use it.
Suggestion: Let’s apply those same rules to the tens of thousands of New Hampshire drivers who make use of our roadways to get to work every day.
How do we do that? By erecting nice, big tollbooths on the main highways that cross from New Hampshire into Massachusetts. If “toll” sounds too unfriendly or unneighborly, well, then feel free to think of it as a “user fee” instead.
Any Massachusetts commuter who lives north of Boston knows what it’s like to be trapped in impossibly heavy morning traffic, hemmed in by cars with New Hampshire plates driven by coffee-swilling motorists who didn’t pay a dime to add to our traffic load.
According to the most recent study from the US Census Bureau, nearly 85,000 Granite Staters commute to Massachusetts for work. Charging them a modest toll to enter and exit our state might not solve all of our transportation budget woes, but it would certainly take the edge off.
Year after year, Massachusetts residents are presented with reports detailing the sorry state of our potholed roads and the growing enormity of the state’s transportation budget gap, which lawmakers use as justification to call for tax increases.
With all of the serious work that needs to be done to fix our infrastructure, why should our neighbors to the north get a free ride? Why should Massachusetts taxpayers be on the hook to pave and plow the path from New Hampshire into Boston for free?
Sure, New Hampshire residents might cry foul on tolls. But before you feel too sorry for them, consider that many of them are Massachusetts transplants taking advantage of the benefits of keeping one foot in each state.
It’s hard to blame them for wanting to free themselves from “Taxachusetts” and seek shelter in the land of no sales tax, lower gas tax, and cheaper homes and land. Just ask former Massachusetts senator Scott Brown.
But should these escapees be allowed to “live free,” as the New Hampshire state motto says, and drive that way to work in Massachusetts, too?
To be fair, New Hampshire commuters are paying Massachusetts income tax if they work in the Bay State. But that money goes to the Legislature’s general fund and gets lost in the Beacon Hill budget abyss. Why not ask them to contribute something toward the infrastructure they’re using and straining every day?
New Hampshire has no problem charging Massachusetts drivers to travel north. Going to the beach in Hampton? That’ll be $4 round trip, please. The privilege of driving up Route 93 to the lakes and mountains for the weekend will cost you $2 round trip.
Well, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
No one likes to pay tolls. But really, it comes down to them or us. One of these days, Massachusetts lawmakers will come calling again for more tax dollars for transportation. If we can offset that money grab by getting New Hampshire commuters to foot some of the bill, then let’s do it.
At the very least, it might make you feel a little bit better the next time you’re commuting home and get cut off by another New Hampshire driver trying to hit the fast lane and book it back to their tax-free haven.
No more free rides.
Meredith Warren is a Republican political analyst and consultant.
Related:
• 2014 | Editorial: As roads crumble, allow tolls on interstates