HARRISBURG -- The only way to rescue the Port Authority of Allegheny County and its Philadelphia counterpart from perpetual budget emergencies is a gasoline tax increase tied to mass transit, a key Democratic legislator said yesterday as his Republican colleague nodded in tacit approval.

An increase, which has support in at least a segment of the Legislature, could make Pennsylvania's gasoline tax the nation's highest.

The state tax now stands at 26 cents a gallon, among the highest in the nation. The amount of the tax increase hasn't been settled, but it's expected to be at least 5 cents.

Republicans in the House and Senate, meanwhile, are withholding support on the proposal until they see precisely where the revenue would go. It could not be sent directly to mass transit, because that's prohibited by the state constitution.

In remarks yesterday to a group of transportation industry lobbyists, House Minority Whip Mike Veon, D-Beaver Falls, said an increase in the gas tax, linked to new transit funding, is necessary because the current unpredictable, piecemeal approach to transit funding isn't working.

The gas tax increase would be used to feed additional road programs around the state and would be accompanied by another bill that creates an explicit funding stream for transit -- perhaps by adding new taxes to tire purchases and car rentals, or setting aside a portion of sales tax revenue.

Transit funding and a higher gas tax technically are separate issues but are politically intertwined. Veon said an urban transit bailout won't be supported by rural legislators unless there's road project money in it for them.

Rep. Rick Geist, R-Altoona, who chairs the House Transportation Committee, avoided the words "gas tax" yesterday but said it's getting tougher for rural lawmakers to support urban transit projects year after year. A reliable funding stream for transit, accompanied by money for rural road and bridge projects, would be more politically appealing.

In a previous interview with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Geist said "the four chairmen are pretty much in concert about an increase [in the gas tax], waiting for [Gov. Ed Rendell] to take the lead."

But Rendell, questioned yesterday, said, "This is not a great climate in which to consider a gas tax."

The price of a gallon of regular unleaded gas is hovering near $2 in Pennsylvania, and light crude oil prices set an all-time high of $51 a barrel yesterday. Rendell said he'd consider signing a gas tax increase if lawmakers sent it to him, but made it clear that he'd prefer to explore other funding options.

Veon and Geist said the best chance for finding new transit funding will be at the end of November, after the election and before the two-year legislative session closes.

Legislators often wait until the final hours of a session to vote on controversial bills.

The gas tax discussions have been going on for at least a year, but have taken a back seat to other topics in Harrisburg, including slot machine gambling, early education expansion and medical malpractice issues.

A beneficiary of a transit and gas tax package would be the Port Authority, which is busy drafting its "doomsday" plan -- a 75-cent increase to the $1.75 base fare, elimination of all weekend and holiday service, streamlining a number of weekday routes and cutting service hours.

The Port Authority is projecting a $30 million deficit for this fiscal year if it doesn't get a state bailout or implement the fare increases and service cuts.

Likewise, Philadelphia's transit agency -- the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, known as SEPTA -- is staring at a $62 million budget deficit.

Gathering support for a tax increase of any kind will be difficult, especially on the heels of December's budget deal, which increased the state's income tax rate by 10 percent. And two months ago, fares on the Pennsylvania Turnpike were raised by about 44 percent.

One way of gathering support for such an unattractive measure would be to attach the gas tax to something that the legislators want -- a pay increase for themselves, as well as for secretaries in Rendell's cabinet. For weeks, there has been talk of pay raises, another item that will probably be discussed in the rush of business at the end of the session.