The House has defeated a measure that makes the tax on oil permanent at 10 percent.
The bill follows up the actions of the 2015 Legislature, which got rid of most of the low price "triggers" to reduce the oil tax -- but lowered the top rate from 11 1/2 percent to 10 percent. But there still was a top-end trigger, so if the price of a barrel of oil hit $90, the tax would go up to 11 percent. As introduced, the bill would have ended that top-end trigger.
The House-Senate conference committee left that in. And the sponsor – House Majority Leader Al Carlson – urged his colleagues to kill it.
"It's terrible tax policy," Carlson said. "We hate it on our income tax, and we would sure hate it on buying a car."
The measure failed on an 81-to-8 vote.