A ballot measure in California that would have imposed a new tax on wealthy residents to help fund electric vehicle subsidies and charging stations went down to defeat Tuesday.
The measure had only lukewarm support from the state’s Democrats, who have overwhelmingly pushed for tougher limits on emissions and promoted electric vehicles throughout the years.
Proposition 30 lost 59.1% to 40.9%, according to California’s Secretary of State.
Measure promoted by Lyft
Aside from helping lower-income residents shift to EVs, 20% of the funds would have been used to help pay for preventing and fighting the wildfires that have become a feature of the impact of climate change in the state of California
Lyft, the ride-hailing service, backed Prop. 30, contributing 95% of the campaign’s total funding, or $45 million. Lyft aims to have 100% of the vehicles on its platform be electric by 2030, so making EV incentives more available to low-income drivers would benefit the company in its search for drivers, according to observers.
But Proposition 30, which was supported by an array of Democratic legislators and environmental groups, had one key opponent, Gov. Gavin Newsom. Newsom has set in motion a plan to end sales of vehicles with internal combustion engines by 2035 and has even as he campaigned across the country for tougher policies to fight climate change.
Proposition would have boosted taxes on the rich
The proposition called for a 1.75% tax on personal income of more than $2 million, or fewer than 43,000 people. State analysts estimate it would raise up to $5 billion a year, mostly to help people buy electric vehicles and to build charging stations, with some also dedicated to resources for fighting wildfires, according to the Associated Press.
Environmental and health group backers argued California needed funding from the proposition to speed the transition away from gas-powered vehicles, which account for 40% of California’s greenhouse gas emissions.
However, California is already a leader in promoting a shift to electric cars and was the first state to ban the sale of gas-powered cars by 2035.
Veloz, the organization set up to encourage and track sales of electrified vehicles in California, recently reported during the third quarter, nearly 18% of the vehicles sold in the state were EVs. Overall, electric vehicles sales in California through the first nine months of 2021 now exceed the sales of EVs across the state in all of 2021.
Following slight decrease in the second quarter in California’s EV sales numbers, EV sales of came back with a vengeance in the third quarter, surpassing record-setting sales numbers by nearly 10,000 vehicles in the first quarter of 2022, according to Veloz.
“With 90,065 electric vehicles sold in California this quarter, Q3 of 2022 surpassed Q3 of 2021 EV sales numbers by over 23,000 vehicles and surpassed Q3 of 2020 by over 52,000 vehicles, showing how rapidly consumer demand for EVs is increasing year over year,” Veloz reported.
At 115 makes or models, the number of different EVs available in California remained the same as the second quarter. However, 31 new electric makes/models joined the market last quarter, offering a increasingly diverse array of EVs in California to meet a broader range of driving need and grow the EV market.