As a Legislative Interim committee looks at potential alternatives to special assessments, the President of the Bismarck-Mandan Chamber and CEO of the Bismarck Mandan Development Association has one.
But Brian Ritter said it will take state action to allow local governments to adopt it.
Ritter said this comes from discussion about how to pay for on-going street and road improvements. He said the proposal is to allow local governments to levy a “street utility tax.”
"It would essentially be a per-month charge on your water utility bill," Ritter said. "Those proceeds would go into the city's general fund, and then be used to redo streets, roads, things like that."
Ritter said what he wants to see is the state allow local governments to take the idea to a vote of the people.
"At this point, we're actually prohibited from asking voter approval of a street utility tax," Ritter said. "So what we want to do is work with the state to give political subdivisions the authority to ask for voter approval of the concept."
Ritter presented the idea to the Legislature’s interim Taxation Committee.
