Proposal from Howard Strassner of the SIerra Club. He would like to come to our meeting on January 24 in the hopes that we will endorse this. Sue ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- *Susan, * *This may duplicate part of some stuff I tried to send while I was having connection difficulties. Please distribute to your Green Group. * *Draft request for the Chapter Transportation Chairs to Request that the SC Board of Directors Implement: The Sustainable and Secure Energy Policy - 1/06 - HS* * * *Summary: The SC should request that Congress enact a Sustainable and Secure Energy Policy (SEP) which will help Americans pay for the increasing cost of energy they use in their homes with Petroleum Security Rebates (PSR) funded by a $5.00 per gallon user fee on all gasoline and diesel used for transportation. The fee amount represents a low side estimate of the subsidies provided to driving (Note 4). PSR will help develop a majority constituency to support this policy because if all of the user fees are returned equally to US households, then the greater number of households who drive less than the average will pay less in fees than their PSR and they will have extra money to pay for their other energy needs. (note 1)* * * *This is a populist approach to jump start the process that took over thirty years with cigarettes. We have reached the point, that this year in California there is a good chance that a ballot proposal to raise the tax on cigarettes by $2.60 a pack might actually pass. The discussion of the user fee will be like a national referendum in which the majority of households will ask Congress to impose fees so that they can net an extra $100 or $200 a month while we get all of the benefits of less driving. In addition when we reduce our consumption of gasoline the world wide price of crude oil will drop. This will be like the oil exporting nations (when compared to today’s oil price) actually covering part of our energy bill. Using less petroleum is more sustainable because we will have more energy for a future. While needing less oil makes us more secure.* *Policy Details:* *All of the funds generated by the user fees should be rebated monthly to minimize economic impacts on families of modest means. The IRS could direct deposit the rebate monthly, based on actual user fee receipts.* *A full share should be returned to households with more than one person and half share to households with one person. (note 2)* *Fee impacts on the cost of gasoline and the shipment of goods should not be included in the Bureau of Labor Statistic Cost of Living because while the sudden increase in the price of gasoline in the seventies, caused by the rapid increase in the price of oil, resulted in the short term production of smaller more efficient cars, this ended when the higher cost of oil became part of our cost of living and then oil production increased which means that gasoline prices are still lower, when corrected for inflation, than they were in the seventies. (note 3). * * * *Policy Alternatives (not included) Which Need Further Study (to if they might assist passage):* *The user fee could be imposed more slowly with increments every year until energy consumption is reduced by a set amount. This may be necessary because the banks may be concerned that a sudden change could impact property values.* *The rebate could be reduced by 5% in order to provide some annual federal funding for transit improvements to help people drive less. On the other hand, if all of the fees are rebated a few more families will support the policy and each community can find the most suitable ways to improve their transit. * * * *Note 1) The US Census Bureau Historical Income Tables, Households for 1994 shows the median income was $39,389. The US Energy Information Agency shows that for 1994 that: Households (probably with cars) with incomes over $50,000 per year drove 27,700 miles per year; Households with $35 to $50,000 income drove 21,600 and households under $15,000 drove 13,800 miles per year. Households headed by a person over 6o years old (and they vote in highest percentages) drove least and households with teen age drivers drove the most. All US households drove 1,793 billion miles in 1994. There were 85 million households with a car and so the average household with a car drove 21,100 miles in 1994.* * * *Note 2) There are about 109 million households in the US in 2005. About 27 million of these households are persons living alone. (per the Bureau of the Census, Population Division, Current Population Reports p25-1129 1996 - Projection of the Number of Households and Families 1995 -2010) Single person households should only get a half rebate because: a) A full rebate would lower the rebate for all and make it more difficult for Congress to do anything; b) Most single person households will have ample reason to support this policy with a half rebate. * * Based on our consumption of 152 billion gallons of gasoline and diesel in 2004, (per the Petroleum Marketing Annual Report) the total user fees would be about $759 Billion a year and the per household rebate (with single households getting a half rebate) would be about $7,900 a year unless we greatly reduced consumption. * *Congress will probably exempt oil used by farm tractors.* * * *Note 3) This will be similar to the way that federal and state income taxes are not now considered part of our official cost of living. Logically, since the user fee will be rebated it will not really be a cost and should not be included in the cost of living. This is important because including the fee in the Cost of Living will over time minimize the economic impact and gasoline consumption will increase again.* Note 4) The subsidy amount is based on costs estimated from 1992 to 1996, without the cost of oil wars, taken from: www.sierraclub.org/sprawl/articles/subsidies.asp <http://www.sierraclub.org/sprawl/articles/subsidies.asp> * * *Proposed DRAFT SC Resolution Sustainable and Secure Energy Policy: * *Whereas, the creation of new fossil fuel resources takes billions of years, which indicates that we are consuming fossil fuels infinitely faster than they are being replaced by nature, and the Sierra Club has a policy of limiting energy consumption to sustainable levels and the United Nation’s definition of sustainable is: “A sustainable society meets the needs of the present without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” and * *Whereas, consumption of this energy results in the production of green house gases which are know to be causing global warming which will result in vast environmental changes; and * *Whereas, the US, with only 5% of the world’s population is now consuming 25% of the world’s annual energy and about 50% of US consumption is used for transportation including: private vehicles, trucks and airplanes; and * * Whereas, US drivers are the beneficiaries of a subsidy of five dollars a gallon (note 4), based on costs assumed by society in general for: streets and highways, courts and police and hospitals and health impacts, and this reduces the apparent cost of gasoline and diesel to consumers which increases the amount of gasoline consumed; and * *Whereas, the Sierra Club has a policy of opposing sprawl because it reduces essential farm lands and open space and encourages additional driving and fuel consumption and supporting neighborhoods which encourage less driving, and * *Whereas, there are many ways for people to reduce their consumption of gasoline and diesel when costs increase, including: driving less and using a more efficient vehicle; car pooling or using transit; walking and bicycling more and living in community that makes it more practical to accomplish more tasks without driving; and * *Whereas, the sudden increase in the price of gasoline in the seventies, caused by the rapid increase in the price of oil, resulted in the short term production of smaller more efficient cars, but this ended when the higher cost of oil became part of our cost of living and oil production then increased and gasoline prices are still lower when corrected for inflation; and * *Whereas people will reduce their consumption of gasoline quickly if they believe that extremely high prices for gasoline are permanent, and imposing a user fee of $5 a gallon to eliminate the subsidy will nearly triple the price of gasoline, and * *Whereas studies show that lower income households generally consume less gasoline than higher income households (note 1), but even after lower income households apply all easily accomplished reductions in their consumption of gasoline they will be severely economically impacted by increased cost for gasoline and other energy needs, and * *Whereas, if all of the funds generated by a $5 per gallon user fee were returned equally to all households (note 2) lower income households would get more returned then they pay out in gasoline taxes and will reduce their gasoline consumption to further improve their standard of living while higher income households, who drive more, will also reduce their gasoline consumption in an attempt to maintain their standard of living, and * *Whereas, transit advocates regularly urge more federal funding for transit projects but these funds are only available for construction of large projects which generally have a significant component of congestion reduction for automobiles but if this resolution is enacted congestion will be reduced; and * *Whereas, transit mostly needs funds for operation and these funds are usually generated by the community providing the transit when the transit is demanded; * * * *Now, Therefore the Sierra Club:* *Resolves, to support the implementation of a Sustainable Secure Energy Policy (SEP) with a user fee on gasoline and diesel, for all transportation uses of $5.00 per gallon; and * *Further Resolves that all of the funds generated by the Tax be rebated monthly, with a full share to households with more than one person and half share to households with one person; and * *Further Resolves that the Bureau of Labor Statistic (BLS) should extract the tax from the cost of gasoline and the increased cost of shipping goods, included in the cost of living (note 3). * * * * *