Fellow Maryland Tesla owners, I just got my registration renewal and saw the new EV surcharge added to our annual fees. This so-called “gas tax replacement” is completely unfair and doesn’t even attempt to mirror the way gas taxes work. Instead of being tied to how much you drive, it’s just an arbitrary fee for owning an EV.
The whole point of the gas tax is that those who use the roads more pay more. But with this new EV tax, someone who barely drives their Tesla is paying the same as someone who drives 30,000 miles a year. It’s completely disconnected from actual road usage.
Meanwhile, Maryland says it wants to encourage EV adoption, yet this tax does the opposite. Why are we being penalized for making the switch to cleaner transportation? If they really wanted fairness, they’d find a way to base the fee on miles driven, not just EV ownership.
We need to push back on this. Has anyone looked into what can be done? Is there an organized effort to fight this? If not, we should start one.
Would love to hear your thoughts, let’s figure out how to take action.
This has been discussed quite a bit in the FB group. I do not share your assessment. While I agree it would be nice if it were tied to how much you drive, there's a lot that has to happen around data sharing and privacy concern mitigation to make that work because there are so many options for charging, including at home. It's not as easy as "oh, I'll just fill in my odometer reading." Would you want to allow a state government agency access to your driving data? Do you think they'd trust the number you put in without any way to verify that?
The number they chose, if you read the bill and its surrounding text, was actually based on the average driver and works out in most EV owner's favor. Only if you drive very little (something like 6000 miles a year, although I don't recall the specfiics) does it not work out in your favor.
So most of us aren't being penalized, but I understand the shock at seeing something that ICE car owners pay a little bit at a time (and also not nearly enough to cover the true costs of all that pollution, not just road maintenance) come up in one unexpectedly large amount on vehicle registration.
If you wish to change that -- and to be clear, I think this is what your post is about, so thank you for asking this question -- get involved with state-level politics. Send letters to your representatives, go to their town halls, publish (thoughtful, polite) letters to the editor or other media options.
