When I renewed my tags this past February, I found out that if you have a vehicle that gets good gas mileage you have to pay an extra $25.00 road use tax. If you have a gas guzzler you don't have to pay it. Is that right? NO!

Fuel tax has historically helped pay for the transportation infrastructure in VA, with contributions tied to usage of that infrastructure and the wear and tear on it.  Hybrid and electric vehicles use that same infrastructure, but many believe they have been contributing less than their fair share...unless you assign value to polluting less (arguable).  I suppose VA now views high-mileage vehicles in the same light.  

I understand they are considering scrapping it all and shifting to a mileage-based user fee, where you pay less if you drive less, regardless of your vehicle technology.  Other states are considering doing the same.  Not sure what will happen beyond what is certain - that they will fuck it up because they are bureaucrats.

They will keep current taxes and add the mileage based stuff. There is no way they don't charge us more.

Agreed.  

And perhaps that makes sense to some extent if they are charging road use fees exclusively to vehicles that don't use traditional fuels or use significantly less fuel, but that scheme still does not account for other critical factors, like weight and number of miles driven in the commonwealth annually...and folks from out of state with EVs are riding for free.

I'm not sure what a fair implementation might look like, but I'm sure we won't see one because their motivation isn't a fair distribution of the burden - it's maximize their tax revenue...and recovering what they think they are "losing" to such vehicles.

Northam counted a reduction in annual registration fees as one of his good deeds for the people during pandemic onset.  Quietly they instituted this in the background to offset it.  Taxes and government funding is just one big game of "hide the ball under the cup."

Our Mazda 3 gets hit with it despite being neither hybrid nor electric.  Across our three vehicles the two reductions plus the one penalty was a wash.  It's pro-rated in on any vehicle rated EPA >25 mpg combined.

If they institute a mileage fee it should be mileage times vehicle weight.  No way my 2700 pound mazda commuter car puts as much strain on infrastructure as my 5400 pound Silverado that does garbage and home improvement store duty.  Generally, fuel taxed per gallon accomplished this.