State Rep. Daniel McNeill, R-133rd, said last week he voted against the transportation funding bill recently signed into law because it includes tax increases and was passed using an unconstitutional procedure.

McNeill explained that the House took a two-page unrelated bill that allows for two-year vehicle registrations and amended it to include almost 100 pages of language that had previously passed the Senate in June.

"The bill was introduced after the deadline to file amendments so it prevented most representatives from offering amendments," McNeill said. "The amendment that did get introduced was not on the public website, so the public could see only the original two-page bill and not the almost 100 pages of the amendment that unconstitutionally changed the original purpose of a bill. The drivers of Pennsylvania had no idea how much they were going to be charged in vehicle fees and increased gas taxes."

The amended bill was voted down in the House twice Nov. 18, and then it passed on a third vote Nov. 19. Only after the amendment passed was the public given access to the language of the amendment, McNeill said.

Rather than using that bill that passed on the third try, the Senate inserted different language into another unrelated two-page bill that allows vertical license plates on motorcycles, again changing the original purpose of that bill, making it unconstitutional.

On Nov. 21, the House passed the Senate's unconstitutional version of the bill, culminating a process in which three different bills were illegally used to stifle opposition to a bill that raises taxes and fees on Pennsylvania drivers. The transparent and constitutional way to pass this legislation would have been to start out with a bill that included the transportation plan language so the public would have had access to the language that was being voted on.

"Many people forget that the 2005 legislative pay raise and the bill bringing slot machine gambling to Pennsylvania both started out as unrelated two-page bills," McNeill said. "The bills were amended with many pages of language that the public never saw until after the fact.

"This unconstitutional process is used to pass controversial legislation without the public paying attention. The time has come for the legislature to stop using illegal procedures to pass legislation that severely impacts Pennsylvanians."