INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Gov. Eric Holcomb has signed into law Indiana’s two-year budget and an infrastructure funding plan featuring tax and fee hikes to pay for improvements.
Holcomb and Republican legislative leaders trumpeted both bills at a signing ceremony in the Statehouse Thursday. They call the roads measure a plan that will “drive Indiana to the next level.”
The bill aims to spend roughly $1.2 billion per year in new funding to replace aging roads and bridges by increasing the state’s fuel tax by 10 cents a gallon and imposing new vehicle fees.
Holcomb says residents will smell asphalt from construction “morning, noon and night.”
The $32 billion budget he also signed sends money toward pay increases for state police and an expansion of the preschool pilot, in addition to other education funding.