I sent this email to my house rep. Other EV owners are free to copy and paste this and change wording as needed. Let’s get this regressive BS changed.
I recently purchased an EV and was required to pay an ‘Alternative Fuel Vehicle Fee’ upon renewing my vehicle registration. In this pivotal moment where domestically-manufactured EVs and batteries represent a huge opportunity for Georgia in terms of jobs and economic impact, it is extremely counterproductive to impose an additional fee on EV owners. As Kia, Hyundai, and Rivian bring vital jobs and opportunity to the state through EV manufacturing, Georgia is sending the wrong message to EV owners that they are not welcome or appreciated for their personal financial investment in this budding technology. I understand that the purpose of this fee is to fund road repairs due to the weight of EVs and the fact that EV owners do not pay a tax on gasoline. However, we pay taxes on electricity when we charge at our homes as well as when we utilize public chargers. If the weight of EVs is the primary concern, perhaps all vehicles regardless of fuel type should pay an annual fee if they gross over a certain weight. It is doubly regressive to impose the Alternative Fuel Vehicle Fee on EV owners when the Georgia gas tax has been repealed for the majority of 2023.
While I do agree with your points and EV owners should get some cost off their registration, I’m going to play devil’s advocate here. The tax vacation was due to high fuel prices, because you don’t buy the fuel that is subject to high prices, why would you get a tax break? It would be the same as ICE vehicle buyers wanting a tax break on vehicle purchases because EV buyers got one.
I do think the registration fees are high in most places, they should be the normal registration plus the average mileage of your state ÷ average fuel economy of a vehicle X gas tax. So in GA (using some national averages) it would be about 13.5k ÷ 25.4 X 31.2 = $166. This would also help to couple EV taxes to current fuel taxes.
In GA its $211 and one of the highest in the nation. I’m actually fine with the flat fee, they just need to do it for all cars and not just EV. Now would be the perfect time since we haven’t collected gas taxes for the 2nd year now.
Is that on top of or included in your registration? In Oregon, we have different prices to renew your registration $126 for the worst fuel economy vehicles up to $316 for EVs, so an extra “tax” of $190.