Daily Herald | Posted: Monday, March 20, 2006 11:00 pm
Utah residents are expected to get a $10 million to $15 million rebate on natural gas expenses now that legislation has been signed that limits the amount of new tax revenue cities can collect.
Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. signed the legislation -- House Bill 309 by state Rep. Greg Hughes, R-Draper -- on Monday. It came out of the Legislature with strong votes of 68-1 in the House of Representatives and 26-0 in the Senate.
The price of natural gas has risen almost 40 percent over the last year. While consumers have felt that hike hit their wallets, cities expected a surge in revenue from sales and use taxes on natural gas.
In legislative discussions of the bill, proponents emphasized that cities did not want the windfall revenue and were worried about the impact of higher collections on ratepayers.
Now cities can keep 10 percent of tax collections that exceed the collections of the previous year. The rest will be returned to customers. The rebates will be sent in December of this year and in 2007.
The legislation emerged from discussions that included Questar Gas, the Utah League of Cities and Towns, and consumer groups, according to a statement from the Utah House of Representatives majority office.
"Questar Gas has been an excellent corporate citizen," Hughes said in the statement. "Without their cooperation, we wouldn't have been able to work out a refund mechanism."
This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D3.