D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty Proposes to Implement New Taxes and Raise Existing Fees

Parking in D.C. on a Saturday? Better feed the meter.

Looking forward to the annual sales tax holiday on back-to-school supplies? Ancient history.

Trying to get a permit for your small business? It's going to cost you more.

In an effort to balance the city's $5.3 billion budget for fiscal 2010, Mayor Adrian M. Fenty is proposing to implement new taxes and raise existing fees, generating more than $70 million in additional revenue.

He also wants to expand the use of high-tech cameras that can detect motorists who accelerate through yellow lights, "block the box" during rush hour, drive trucks that weigh too much for city roads or speed through tunnels. More aggressive traffic enforcement would bring in an additional $36 million, administration officials said.

Fenty (D), who promised during his campaign that he would not raise taxes, has referred to the changes as "fees increases." Asked last week why they should not be considered tax increases, Fenty replied: "Because I don't define it as one."

Council members have questioned Fenty's semantics.

"In terms of the particular fees, a little straight talk is appropriate. It's a kind of tax," said Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3). "We're increasing costs on people in a variety of ways."

The mayor's budget would establish a new streetlight maintenance tax that would add $51 a year to residents' electric bills, and Fenty proposes to increase the 911 service fee on all cellphones and land lines by about $12 a year.

Homeowners, long protected by a property tax cap, will have to pay taxes on at least 40 percent of their property's assessed value, and the mayor wants to freeze the homestead deduction and the personal exemption and standard deduction on income taxes.

Cheh said she supported some of the changes, including the increase to parking meter rates citywide -- the council already raised downtown rates -- and the improved traffic enforcement, because many drivers live in Maryland and Virginia. But she expressed concern about the streetlight maintenance fee, which could burden low-income residents.

Council member Phil Mendelson (D-At Large), chairman of the Committee on Public Safety, blocked Fenty's proposal last year to increase the 911 fee and expressed concerns again at a council oversight hearing on the budget Monday.

"We have rejected some of these increases in the past, and I hope we do so again," said Mendelson, who shares Cheh's concern about poor residents.

Fenty has stressed that his office slashed spending in some agencies and eliminated more than 1,600 jobs through layoffs, attrition and cutting vacant openings. "We were able to eliminate a lot of unnecessary programs, and we raised some fees we thought needed to be raised just in the normal operations of government," Fenty said. "We believe we struck the right balance."