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A proposed increase in Colorado’s state tire fee is meeting opposition from the Rubber Manufacturers Association (RMA).
If the $1.75 per-tire hike is enacted, Centennial State consumers will pay an extra $13 for every set of four tires purchased. Colorado’s total take would amount to more than $14 million a year, but none of these funds would be used to clean up the largest scrap tire pile in the U.S. – some 40 million tires in El Paso County, according to RMA Vice President Michael Blumenthal.
State tire fees are typically used to pay for the cleanup of discarded tires and creating markets for scrap tires. Unfortunately, says Blumenthal, Colorado diverts 80 percent of the current tire fee to other purposes and has not been active in either stockpile abatement or developing markets for the 4.5 million scrap tires the state generates each year.
A state-by-state survey of waste tire management conducted by the RMA shows that Colorado has the most stockpiled tires of any state with 45 million tires, amounting to more than one-third of all the discarded tires in the nation.
“Colorado’s pro-environment reputation is challenged by the state’s abysmal record in managing waste tires,” Blumenthal contends.
Last week, the Colorado Senate approved Senate Bill 09-31-18-15 to raise the tire fee by $1.75 to a total of $3.25 per tire, designating the funds for economic development. The RMA hopes to kill the measure in the House, where a vote is expected soon.
“It makes sense to impose fees on tires if the funds are used to address scrap tire issues,” says Blumenthal. “But when these revenues are hijacked for other purposes, a state may suffer far worse environmental consequences and cleanup costs if a major tire stockpile catches fire. In too many states, this failure to act has caused significant environmental harm and cost the state tens of millions of dollars in clean up costs.”
Other states throughout the U.S. have been more active in cleaning up waste tires and working to foster a productive market for reused tires, he points out.
In 1990, more than a billion tires were stockpiled nationwide while only 11 percent of them were reused. Today, about 125 million old tires remain, yet more than 85 percent of the annually generated scrap tires are now recycled in some way.
For more information, visit www.rma.org.
