Raimondo’s Truck Toll Program Ruled Unconstitutional by Federal Court Judge
Wednesday, September 21, 2022
One of U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo’s most celebrated — and controversial — initiatives as Governor of Rhode Island was her “RhodeWorks” truck toll program.
When unveiled in 2015, it was billed as a revenue mechanism to help fund repairs for the state’s crumbling infrastructure.
"Rhode Island cannot afford to sit on the sidelines while our infrastructure continues to deteriorate," said Raimondo on October 8, 2015. "This study again confirms that RhodeWorks is a smart approach to fix our crumbling infrastructure, create thousands of jobs, and accelerate our economic comeback by putting millions of dollars into the pockets of Rhode Islanders. It's time to stop dragging our feet and start taking action."
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLASTAccording to the Rhode Island Department of Transportation, the full budget for RhodeWorks is about $4.9 billion over ten years "and about one tenth of that amount will come from the tolling program." The RhodeWorks law prohibits tolls on cars and small trucks.
The trucking industry claimed it was discriminatory — singling out only trucks taking part in interstate commerce — and sued in 2018.
And on Wednesday, the trucking industry won a major victory in federal court.
Judge Says RhodeWorks is Unconstitutional
“The RhodeWorks tolling program violates the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution. For this reason, the State is permanently enjoined from further tolling under the law,” wrote District Judge Will Smith in his 91-page decision.
Smith noted that RhodeWorks “failed to fairly apportion its tolls among bridge users based on a fair approximation of their use of the bridges, ]and] was enacted with a discriminatory purpose, and is discriminatory in effect.”
In his decision, Smith noted Raimondo’s role.
“While governors and business owners and tourism officials have grumbled for decades about this reality, in 2015 then-governor Gina Raimondo and her compatriots in the General Assembly figured out a way finally to monetize the ‘fast lane to Cape Cod’ – by tolling the bridges along the major interstate and state highway corridors that connect ‘little Rhody’ to its larger neighbors and states beyond.
Raimond is currently being speculated to replace Janet Yellin as U.S. Treasury Secretary.
Whether or not tolls could be expanded to include cars to address the issue of decimation was not mentioned in Smith’s decision.
“We just learned about the ruling in the long-running litigation process resulting from the 2016 legislation. The General Assembly prohibited the tolling of passenger cars, and regardless of the eventual outcome of this lawsuit, that will not change,” said Speaker Shekarchi (D-Dist. 23, Warwick) and President Ruggerio (D-Dist. 4, North Providence, Providence).
“We want to very clear: the Governor and his Administration do not support and would not implement a tolling program on passenger vehicles. As this ruling has just come out, our team is reviewing the decision and evaluating next steps,” said Matt Sheaff, Governor Dan McKee’s spokesperson in a statement.
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