10 PERCENT AIR EXCISE TAX MAY BOOMERANG.

Byline: Jerry Ackerman Boston Globe

The now-you-see-it, now-you-don't excise tax on airline tickets that confounded travelers last winter is about to disappear again. The 10 percent levy expires at the end of this year, and airlines already are issuing tickets based on the notion that it won't come back.

But don't count on that.

Before adjourning in September, Congress made clear some sort of tax or fee on airline use is a priority. The tax goes into a trust fund that finances the Federal Aviation Administration, including the air traffic control system. Without a steady income flow, the fund is expected to be cleaned out by next May - while the FAA is being pressed to step up its safety efforts.

The renewal of a ticket tax is an option before a special congressional subcommittee that has been set up to look at this and other transportation funding issues next year. Another option is an airport-use tax on airlines, to be based on the number of takeoffs and landings their planes make.

If some of this sounds familiar, it is because the ticket tax went through a series of ups and downs last winter, after a Congress at loggerheads with the White House over the federal budget let the tax expire without prior notice.

Thousands of travelers had already paid the tax and were entitled to refunds.