Washington State Supreme Court to decide $30 car tabs

The fate of Initiative 976, which would limit motor vehicle license fees (car tab fees) to $30 per year and was approved by the state’s voters in November, will now be decided by the Washington State Supreme Court.

In the months after voters approved the ballot measure by 53 percent to 47 percent, it has been tied up in King County Superior Court, where Judge Marshall Ferguson had to rule on constitutional challenges brought by the Garfield County Transportation Authority, King County, the city of Seattle, the Washington State Transit Association, the Association of Washington Cities and others.

Initiative 976, which was put on hold pending Judge Ferguson’s review, survived largely intact in his courtroom. On February 12, the honorable judge rejected and dismissed all but two of the plaintiffs’ constitutional claims, but he left the “preliminary injunction” on Initiative 976 in place until those two remaining claims were resolved.

On March 12, the first of the remaining two challenges succeeded: Judge Ferguson ruled that provisions of the initiative requiring vehicle values to be based on the Kelley Blue Book violated the “privileges and immunities” clause of the state constitution. That clause prohibits singling out certain citizens or corporations for special privileges that do not equally belong to all citizens or corporations. But Judge Ferguson determined that the unconstitutional provisions favoring Kelley Blue Book were “severable” from the rest of Initiative 976, which was preserved.

The second remaining constitutional challenge was specific to the city of Burien, which issued bonds years ago to finance street improvements. To service its bond debt, the city had imposed an extra $10 vehicle license fee on its residents and pledged to give some of that revenue to its bondholders. Burien is now arguing that Initiative 976 unconstitutionally impairs its legal contracts with its bondholders.

While the city of Burien’s claim is still being litigated, Judge Ferguson planned to let Initiative 976 go into effect for the whole state except Burien. “The injunction against implementation of I-976 is lifted, except as to the severed” sections, he wrote in a March 12 order.

But on March 27, Judge Ferguson granted the plaintiffs’ emergency motion to delay Initiative 976 for everybody until the Washington State Supreme Court rules on the issue. “The date to lift the preliminary injunction … is continued from March 27, 2020 until such date when the Washington Supreme Court rules on plaintiffs’ emergency motion for stay pending review,” he wrote in a March 27 order.

According to a March 30 ruling in the Washington State Supreme Court, the next step will take place on April 28, when the state’s high court will consider whether Judge Ferguson’s order lifting the preliminary injunction for everyone except Burien should go into effect, or whether it should be “stayed” pending the appeal. The high court will also decide whether to retain the appeal for direct review.

Initiative 976 was sponsored by Tim Eyman, who is now running for governor of Washington state as a Republican. Various cities in the state, including Blaine, have said that the initiative, if it goes into effect, threatens to significantly reduce state funding for local road projects. In October last year, Blaine city council passed a resolution opposing Initiative 976.