Seven proposals to change Idaho's taxes and fees on trucks were withdrawn or killed in the State House Transportation Committee last week.
One of those proposals was resurrected after a vote to kill it, but the committee adjourned without passing it to the House floor, according to the Lewiston Morning Tribune.
Representatives say they are seeking relief for small trucking companies. But the state trucking association does not believe any of the proposals was an answer, including a measure that would have reinstated the ton-mile tax, which was withdrawn.
The bills came in the wake of Idaho's settlement last year of a truck tax lawsuit it lost to the American Trucking Associations. ATA attorney Bruce Jones warned the committee that any of the measures, if they increased tax or fee rates disproportionately for larger interstate trucking companies, could violate terms of the settlement agreement and send the state back to court.
A court declared unconstitutional a truck tax structure that hit larger, interstate trucking firms at higher rates than smaller, in-state firms. A more level system has been used since, but many of Idaho's smaller carriers claim the new tax structure is putting them out of business.