Georgia's TSPLOST

Some Georgia counties approved while others rejected a Transportation Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (TSPLOST) in the May election.

This was the second time voters in the Peach State voiced their opinion on TSPLOST in most of the state.  In the first vote in 2013, most of the state rejected the tax.  Those few places where it passed still have several more years running on the 10-year tax.

TSPLOST is one of three Special Purpose Sales Taxes in the state.  The regular SPLOST is split between the county government and city governments in that county.  The Education SPLOST is specifically for school systems.  SPLOST and ESPLOST have much tighter restrictions than TSPLOST and stay in each county.  Georgia also has a Local Option Sales Tax which is not voted on by the public and a state sales tax.

The two major differences between TSPLOST and the other two Special Purpose taxes are:

1) TSPLOST is shared across regions in the state served by a Regional Commission.  The Regional Commissions assist local governments with grants, developing ordinances and complying with state and federal rules.  Each county in the region with the tax gets to keep 25 percent of the tax.  The rest goes into a pot for regional projects.

2) TSPLOST can be spent on anything transportation related.  The other two taxes are tightly controlled; money may be spent only for items listed in the referendum and cannot be spent on recurring expenses like salaries.  The 25 percent local share of TSPLOST can pay salaries for workers in a Road Department, buy equipment and supplies and provide matching funds for state road work grants.

Supporters pointed to the road improvements possible with the tax.  In some counties, 25 percent of the collected tax is a sizable amount of money.  Rural counties on the interstates, like Turner County on Interstate 75, can collect as much as four times the sales tax of counties off the major roads.