Capitol Report: Gas Tax Refund – Get Yours

Get 5¢ back per gallon of gas now, and 7.5¢ in 2024

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The deadline to submit receipts for the gas tax refund is October 1, 2023. Submit this form to get 5 cents back per gallon of gas purchased between July 1, 2022 and June 30, 2023.

Did you know that you can save your gas receipts and get your money back? Next year, you will be able to get 7.5 cents back per gallon, 10 cents the next year, and 12.5 cents after that.

Simply keep your gas receipts, fill out this form, mail/email the completed form, and the State Treasurer will write you a check.

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  1. Save your receipts
  2. Fill out the form
  3. Submit your form
    • Submit as a download to [email protected] OR
    • Mail to Taxation Division, PO Box 800, Jefferson City, MO 65105-0800

If you don’t have your receipts for this year, get 7.5 cents per gallon back by saving your new receipts & submitting the form next year.

The Story of the Gas Tax and SAPA (the Second Amendment Preservation Act)

In Missouri, we have the Hancock Amendment in our Constitution.  The Hancock Amendment requires tax increases to be voted on by the people, not just passed by the legislature. Several times the gas tax increases were put before Missouri voters and rejected, most recently in 2018.

However, in 2021, a coalition of legislators, both Democrats and Republicans, passed a 12.5 cent per gallon gas tax increase down on the people of our state.  The bill increases our gas tax by 2.5 cents per gallon for five years, eventually increasing the tax by 12.5 cents per gallon.  We just finished year two under the gas tax increase, meaning we were paying 5 cents per gallon more because of this law last year.  This year, we are paying 7.5 cents per gallon extra.

The legislature knew this would likely be ruled unconstitutional because of the Hancock Amendment, so a workaround was created to avoid the Missouri Constitution.  They decided that they would collect the tax up front, but that if people remembered to collect their receipts and remembered to turn them in, they could get their money back.

Although I was not in the legislature at the time this went through, I vehemently opposed the workaround and the gas tax as a citizen.  The gas tax money collected, in large portion, ended up not going to roads and bridges, but to MODOT salary increases.

At the end of the day in 2021, the then President Pro Tem of the Senate threatened to kill the Second Amendment Preservation Act (SAPA) if they didn’t pass his bill to increase the gas tax.  All too often, good bills like SAPA are used to leverage the passage of bad bills like the gas tax.  This session we worked hard to ensure the bill preventing gender mutilation of kids, the SAFE Act, passed out of the Senate early in session this year, so our kids would not be leveraged like our Second Amendment Rights had been in the past.

My Goal = Be Transparent to Keep You Informed

It is my mission to bring you alongside me in this journey and to share with you what is really going on in Jefferson City.  I feel that the gas tax increase, how it was passed, and your ability to get money refunded are all things that are important for the people to know. I believe in being as transparent as possible and looking out for the citizens of Jasper and Newton County.

If you found this helpful, please share this with your friends and help us bring others alongside us in our efforts to ensure more communication and community participation in these important conversations.

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