Consider the political oddity that is the electric vehicle sales tax exemption: Unless the Legislature acts this year, it expires July 1. A bipartisan group of legislators, known collectively as the electric vehicle caucus, has teamed up to extend it, which is something Gov. Jay Inslee is also pushing for.

And yet, extending the exemption faces daunting legislative hurdles from two lawmakers whose politics couldn’t be further apart: Senate Majority Leader Mark Schoesler of Ritzville and House Finance Chairman Reuven Carlyle of Seattle.

Schoesler said in a meeting with reporters Tuesday morning that the exemption will have to fit within the context of the state budget this year. Letting the tax preference sunset at the beginning of the fiscal year means the state can start banking the revenue it would have otherwise spent. The Department of Revenue, according to the Associated Press, estimated it costs about $13 million next year and $17 million in 2017, which depends on the number of electric vehicles sold.

The tax break has been singled out by conservatives as simply a perk for the affluent, as the cars range in price from about $29,000 for a Nissan Leaf to $69,000 for a Tesla Model S, and even more for other models. Killing the tax exemption means more operating revenue for public schools or other budget needs.

“We have to pause and wait and see on all of the tax exemptions,” Schoesler said. “Can we fit it in the budget box? How many jobs does it retain or create?”

Carlyle also questioned the value of the tax incentive, and if the prospective electric car buyer would continue to make the purchase despite having to pay the sales tax on the car. He is aggressively targeting a wide swath of the state’s system of tax preferences.

House Finance Chairman Reuven Carlyle, D-Seattle, on the House floor.

“The electric vehicle exemption is a policy that is put in place to try to move behavior,” Carlyle said in an interview. “It’s important that we make it work for the public. I am reluctant to embrace the proverbial winners and losers, which our current tax system does.”

THE EV CAUCUS

The diverse group of lawmakers, started by Sen. Mark Mullet, D-Issaquah, last fall, includes Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon, D-Burien, Rep. Chad Magendanz, R-Issaquah, Sen. Andy Hill, R-Redmond, Rep. Ed Orcutt, R-Kalama, Rep. Dick Muri, R-Steilacoom, Rep. Jake Fey, D-Tacoma, Sen. John McCoy, D-Tulalip, and Sen. Pramila Jayapal, D-Seattle.

Magendanz said he believes more widespread adaptation of electric vehicles would be an effective deterrent against the fact that cars and trucks contribute about half of the state’s total carbon emissions. Magendanz, who majored in electrical engineering in college, said he owns an electric BMW and an electric motorcycle.

It’s not just carbon dioxide, Magendanz notes. Tailpipe emissions from cars and trucks also account for majority of the heavy particulate, such as the soot that results from diesel combustion.

Rep. Chad Magendanz, R-Issaquah

“From a market standpoint, we want to reduce those entry points as much as we can,” Magendanz said. “What we find with these tax incentives, they work. We want to kind of get that critical mass in the market to get the mass adoption.”

It has drawbacks: A lack of charging stations in some areas of the state, and the fact that the battery charge makes it more suited for commuting than long distances. Gas prices have also plummeted in the last few months. An electric vehicle’s financial benefits will be a different proposition with gas at $2 a gallon than it was at $4, Magendanz notes.

Yet, plug-in vehicle sales have grown on the national scale, from 17,735 total in 2011 to 118,773 in 2014, according to the Electric Drive Transportation Association. According to the association, two years ago the U.S. had about 70,000 battery electric vehicles and 104,000 plug in hybrids, which compares to an overall figure of 226 million registered cars nationwide.

California leads the nation with about half of all plug-ins located within its borders, but Washington is the only other state to have a per-capita adoption rate of more than 3 electric vehicles per 1,000 registered cars.

Electric vehicle registration by county; map courtesy the Department of Transportation.

Michael Mann, a lobbyist who represents Nissan in Olympia, said he doesn’t want to see lawmakers letting the sales tax exemption expire based on the drop in the price of gasoline.

“The price of gas has gone down but I don’t think many people are going to believe it’s going to stay down for a long time,” Mann said. “You’re making a 7 to 10-year financial investment. Nissan has been a leader in electric vehicles in Washington state. This incentive is one of the reasons.”

LEGISLATIVE PROPOSALS

There’s currently two competing bills that would extend the sales tax exemption beyond July. One, requested by the governor and co-sponsored by Sens. Marko Liias, D-Mukilteo, and Steve Litzow, R-Mercer Island, would cap the amount of sales tax exemption at $60,000 per car, and extend the tax break to 2025.

Another bill, co-sponsored by Hill, Mullet, McCoy, Sen. Karen Keiser, D-Kent, Litzow and Jayapal, would put the cap at $45,000 and extend the break through 2021.

Any additional sales tax revenue generated beyond that would go to an infrastructure bank to install more charging stations along the public highway system. Inslee has his own measure to create the infrastructure bank.

His proposal would be funded through his cap-and-trade program, which is up against stiff opposition in the Legislature this year. But Carlyle credited the governor with proposing a revenue source for the exemption. Carlyle wrote on his Facebook page in December that he wanted to see offsetting revenue for electric vehicles’ sales tax exemption, which would amount to about $60 million over four years.

He said Tuesday that he isn’t a “hard no” on extending the exemption, but wants to see measurable results from the tax break. Both the Inslee proposal and the one sponsored by Mullet would require the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee review the tax incentive to measure performance, which can be a mixed bag in terms of getting quantifiable data. The sales tax exemption has been in place since 2005, and electric vehicle sales have taken off in recent years through technological advancements.

“I am not a ‘hard no’ on any of the proposals coming before the Legislature,” Carlyle said. “If it’s something that’s going to happen regardless of what the state does, I’ve got to be…questioning of the value. The governor’s job is to propose. Our job is to debate or dispose.”

Magendanz said he appreciated the fiscally responsible approach Carlyle is taking, but doesn’t want to see the Legislature move to something that would be short-sighted.

“Reuven’s taken it upon himself to be a bit more aggressive,” Magendanz said. “I respect what he’s doing. We’re up against some pretty big challenges to fund McCleary. We don’t want to make shortsighted decisions that would harm the state in the long run.”

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