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Well
into its sixth straight year of trying
half-measures and cost-shifting ideas for
transportation funding, the Virginia General
Assembly appears to be readying itself to do
something more than sing about the hole in the
bucket. The action would have to come in a special
legislative session sometime in the months ahead.
Without action the FY2009-2014 Six-Year
Improvement Plan (SYIP) will require a cumulative
$1.4 billion to be moved from construction into
highway maintenance.
Most of us are familiar with the circular argument
in the old song between Henry and Liza that begins
and ends with “There’s a hole in the
bucket.” Henry is all about stating the problem.
Liza is always ready with the incremental
solution. Liza’s suggestions, stanza by stanza,
respond to Henry’s questions -- to fix it, dear
Henry, with straw that he should cut with the
hatchet that he’s sharpened on the stone he has
wetted with water he has carried in the bucket.
“There’s a hole in the bucket, dear Liza, a
hole,” Henry laments as he ends up at the point
where he started. The song endures because there
are fewer things cuter than the singing back and
forth between boys and girls. But what we applaud
in children wears thin when proffered by adults as
transportation policy.
The hole is in Virginia’s transportation
maintenance budget. It started innocently enough
as revenues dedicated to the Highway Maintenance
and Operations Fund began to grow more slowly than
maintenance needs. The initial diversion of
construction funds from the Transportation Trust
Fund was fairly discrete. Since FY2003, however,
the costs of ordinary maintenance of ditches,
potholes and equipment, rehabilitation and
reconstruction of bridges, guardrails and drainage
pipe, and daily operations and incident management
have grown by double digits each year.
The Virginia Department of Transportation
estimates, for example, that the average cost per
lane-mile of a one-and-one-half inch of asphalt
overlay has jumped 85 percent in the last five
years. Seven of Virginia’s nine transportation
districts now spend more on maintenance than
construction. Actual spending for maintenance in
the current fiscal year ($1.26 billion) virtually
equals spending for construction ($1.36 billion).
And maintenance and operations costs are projected
to grow at four percent a year, even in a
less-than-booming economy.
As is the case with Henry, some members of the
General Assembly have been content to move
unimaginatively from one question to the next. One
can see the hole, but do we really need water? Why
is there a hole in the bucket? Was the bucket
poorly made? Did past users of the bucket cause
the damage? Should bucket users pay a special fee?
What if we encourage users to explore other
water-carrying options? Perhaps the improvement of
the overall economy will prompt the bucket to fix
itself.
In 2007 the General Assembly did include in its
transportation funding package some new revenue
sources for the Highway Maintenance and Operations
Fund, including the so-called abuser fees for
habitually bad drivers and taxes on auto insurance
premiums. But with abuser fees now repealed, half
of the hole still needs to be fixed. And until the
hole in the maintenance budget is fixed, new
revenues to be generated by regional plans in
Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads will end up
substituting for, not complementing, state
revenues.
In special session later this year, the Assembly
will have the opportunity to put revenues for
bridge repair, road construction and more robust
system operations on solid footing by approving
new revenues that not only fill the hole but grow
as maintenance needs grow. The Virginia's
delegates and senators can return the Henry-Liza
“hole in the bucket” song to the elementary
schools where it belongs.
--
April 21, 2008
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