(Center Square) – Proposition 400, a statewide sales tax set aside for local infrastructure projects, will either be extended by lawmakers opposing it and Gov. Expires in 2025 unless voters are asked to do so. approve it.

The Republican-led Congress sent Hobbes a version of the sales tax originally approved in 1985 that would limit how the tax money could be used, such as for the expansion of the valley’s polarized light rail.

“We’ve removed the hole,” Senate President Warren Peterson, Republican Gilbert, said during a congressional debate on Tuesday. “This is very close to what is actually published, but there was a loophole that we fixed.”

Hobbes told reporters on Tuesday that he would likely veto the bill.

Half a cent may seem insignificant, but the Maricopa Government Association said Proposition 400 will cost taxpayers $664.8 million in fiscal 2022. That’s more than $107 million more than the year before, when the economy was still recovering from COVID-19. Pandemic.

If that measure fails, the mayors, who face losing that money, say they will force a vote on the issue.

“These legislators are spouting half-truths about special interests, not negotiating in good faith, and their transportation priorities are in line with reality as the fastest-growing county in the United States. It just doesn’t fit.” A group of Maricopa County mayors said in an open letter that the loss of these funds would lead to “California-style traffic jams and congestion” in the valley. “We are adamantly opposed to their plan and, if no solution is found, we have no choice but to pursue alternative avenues to bring this plan to voters in 2024.”

Winning at a polling place will have to climb an even steeper slope than before. 2022 Voter Approved Proposition 123. The change, ironically approved by just over half of voters, would require him to meet the 60% threshold for the ballot initiative to succeed.