Water Sector News
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To pay for clean water, lawmakers look to ed fund
Lawmakers may have finally hit on a source of funding for the state’s long-term water cleanup efforts: the education fund.
The House Ways and Means Committee has advanced a proposal to dedicate 4% of meals and rooms tax revenues to clean water projects, in S.96. Currently, those tax revenues flow to the education fund.
To backfill the $7.6 million, the committee is proposing a new sales tax on cloud computing software and veterinary supplies. Together, those taxes would raise a little over $7 million.
The committee voted to approve the plan 10-1 Friday. The lone dissenter was Rep. Cynthia Browning, D-Arlington, who said she was anxious about using a new, untested tax source to backfill revenues from the Education Fund, which pays for the state’s pre-K-12 public schools.