Gov. Wes Moore’s plan to pay for transportation projects with a new 75-cent surcharge on meals, Amazon orders and other home deliveries has opened up an argument about who will pick up the tab.

Overshadowed by other taxes and fees announced on budget day this week, the fee would apply to any products that are subject to Maryland’s sales tax. Groceries, prescriptions and feminine hygiene products, for example, are exempt from the sales tax, so there would not be a delivery fee for orders that only include those items.

The fee also would only apply to businesses that make at least $500,000 in retail sales per year. Platforms like DoorDash that connect buyers and sellers, known as “marketplace facilitators,” fall into that category and would have to pay the fee. Moore’s team estimates the fee would raise $225 million.

While administration officials are adamant that this is a fee on big businesses like Amazon and DoorDash, they acknowledged it’s possible the cost will be passed on to customers.

“Any type of fee or tax could ultimately be passed through to customers in the form of increased prices by a company,” Eric Luedtke, the governor’s senior policy adviser. “Whether the businesses, in this case, choose to do it is up to them.”

Republicans in the state legislature are already attacking the proposal as a new tax on Marylanders.

“I live in the real world,” said Del. Jason Buckel, the minority leader in the House of Delegates. “When businesses have additional costs imposed upon them by government mandates, they tend to ultimately pass those costs on to the end consumer.”

Luedtke challenged opponents of the fee to suggest an alternative way to pay for the upkeep of Maryland’s roads. Finding new sources of money for the state transportation fund has become increasingly urgent amid rising costs and declining gas tax revenues.

“There are very large and very heavy vehicles coming down neighborhood streets,” Luedtke said. “That’s putting wear and tear on your neighborhood streets. This fee exists to offset that cost.”

Under Moore’s plan, Maryland would be the third state to impose a retail delivery fee, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, joining Colorado and Minnesota. States including New York and Illinois have also considered legislation to introduce one.

A 75-cent fee in Maryland would be the highest in the nation. Colorado’s retail delivery fee is 29 cents through June 2025; Minnesota’s is 50 cents and applies only to purchases of $100 or more.

News of Moore’s fee proposal came as he announced tax cuts averaging $173 for the majority of Marylanders and tax hikes for the state’s top earners. The delivery fee is not part of Moore’s $67.3 billion budget plan, but is included in the Consolidated Transportation Program, the six-year capital budget for Maryland’s Department of Transportation.

The delivery fee proposal comes a year after Maryland lawmakers passed a 75-cent fee on ride-hailing services and considered, but did not pass, a 50-cent delivery fee.

Last year’s bill explicitly stated that businesses were allowed to collect the fee from buyers. If businesses did pass on the cost to customers, the bill would have required them to identify the new charge as a “Road Impact Fee.”

It received opposition from Uber and DoorDash, which both said the fee would end up costing consumers more.

“A new delivery tax means that customers will pay more for the goods they’re buying,” said Chad Horrell, a DoorDash representative, in written testimony last year. “When prices go up, people buy less. That means businesses will lose order volume and revenue.”

Del. Ben Barnes, the chair of the House of Delegates Appropriations Committee, said he hopes the cost of a delivery fee would not be passed to consumers, but that the money for transportation “has got to come from somewhere.”

“We need good roads and bridges, safe transportation,” he said. “Those things cost money, particularly with the inflationary pressures we’ve seen in the last few years.”