Two identical bills in the House and Senate would increase transportation revenue, such as vehicle registration and license fees, and are likely to be voted on by the full legislature any day now. The new money would be up to $126 million dollars more each year for roads, in addition to the one BILLION of state funding that already goes to roads. These bills just received new numbers – House File 2691 and Senate File 2420. Ask your legislators to vote no because:

1.    There is no fix-it-first policy to assure us that maintenance will come first, and in this legislation, the new money could be wasted on expensive new roads.

2.    Public transit does not receive additional, annual funding with the new money. Additional, reliable state funding for transit would help us avoid high gas prices and reduce our carbon footprint.

1. ROAD MAINTENANCE NOT THOROUGHLY ADDRESSED

As you’ve traveled in your community, you've noticed the rough shape of the roads. This past winter has been brutal on our roads. Many of our gravel roads are messy and dangerous. Our paved roads are dented with potholes. We know there's maintenance work to do, but it takes money to do that work. Our spending policies have to be changed to be certain that these needs will be met.

In the media, elected officials and Governor Culver will talk about how this funding will improve our existing roads. That sounds good, but how many roads won't be fixed when the policy allows for expensive new road projects to be easily eligible for the new funding?

House File 2691 and Senate File 2420 would put up to $126 million more a year into roads. This may look okay on the surface, but here's the real scoop on this road policy:

The allocation of the funding doesn't make maintenance the foundation of funding decisions. Sixty percent of it would go to the state for highways, twenty percent to counties, and twenty percent to cities. HERE'S HOW IT WOULD BE SPENT:

•    The Iowa DOT, which would receive a lion's share of the funding, could waste the money on expensive highway projects for speculative development interests. The legislation lacks language to prioritize maintenance of highways and interstates.

•    Cities could spend their funding on whatever roads they choose- existing OR new – meaning some developers could put the pressure on to fulfill wish lists for new roads.

•    Counties would have to spend their funding primarily on maintenance. However, after learning about the maintenance needs of county roads, it's obvious that the way this funding would be distributed won't satisfy maintenance needs of many Iowa counties.

The spending plan for this new money is not based on a tier system of solving our dire maintenance needs first. (A fix-it-first policy) If the state could adopt a policy on controlling sprawl and saying no to costly, unneeded highway projects, then we'd be confident that our maintenance needs were being addressed.

2. TRANSIT FUNDING KEPT AT LOW LEVEL

House File 2691 and Senate File 2420 outline the increases of various registration and license fees while moving around pots of money the state administers.

The Lost Opportunity for Transit:

Transit funding is shuffled to another source or revenue in this legislation, but not increased. In this maneuver of state revenue, the percentage of revenues that transit receives is moved to another pot of money than it's current source. Its percentage of funding of this mix of revenues was 4 percent in the old system, and 4 percent in the new system due to this legislation. This is essentially the same amount, about 10 million depending on the fluctuation of fees that are paid. Lawmakers could have bumped up that percentage and provided a few million extra dollars of reliable money each year to urban and rural transit systems statewide. But they haven't.

Transit Gets Stuck in a Ditch:

We have suggested this increase in transit funding to lawmakers, but no one has been willing to offer the amendment. Even our allies in the legislature are paving the way for roads to receive all of the new money.

This last week when we asked a transit-supportive legislator about this, and she said we couldn’t get more transit money “because we can't find enough money for roads.”

If the legislature considers a gas tax increase NEXT session in 2009, which lawmakers and the Governor say they will be, transit will be left out of that funding because the gas tax is constitutionally protected just for roads.

Right now we have a golden opportunity to increase transit funding. If the legislature passes these bills then they will be letting the opportunity cruise on by.

YOUR LAST CHANCE TO CONTACT POLICYMAKERS

With the end of the 2008 session about a week away, and with transportation legislation up for a vote any day now, your voices are more important now then ever. Please contact your Representative and Senator today!

The switchboard for members of the House is (515) 281-3221; the switchboard for members of the Senate is (515) 281-3371.

You can look up your legislators by typing in your address and find their contact information at:

http://www.legis.state.ia.us/FindLeg/

Email form to send to Governor Chet Culver:

http://www.governor.iowa.gov/administration/contact/