ATHENS, Ga. — In countless horror stories, it is only a single, bullet cast in silver that strikes dead the werewolf and frees the town folk from their ongoing nightmare. Despite all of the agony and tribulations, the solution proves to be simple, quick and relatively painless, at least for everyone but the furry beast.
For years, state policymakers have searched, without luck, for a single-shot way to slay their traffic-congestion/road-maintenance monster. Last week, legislators and interested business executives trekked to Athens in hopes of hearing that it had been found.
“I don’t think there’s a silver bullet,” said Seth Millican, executive director of the Georgia Transportation Alliance, a branch of the Georgia Chamber of Commerce.
Alan Essig, executive director of the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute — a leftward-leaning think tank, offered the same observation.
“I don’t think there is one silver bullet; raising one tax won’t do it,” he said.
Although Millican and Essig come from divergent points of view and often differ on public policies, in separate interviews they used nearly identical wording to summarize the challenge in finding $1 billion or more in annual funding.
They agree that tackling transportation will require a multipronged approach — such as increasing the gas tax or sales tax, toll roads, and billing alternative-fuel vehicles per mile driven. And they agree that the politicians are going to have to grit their teeth and vote to raise taxes of some sort.
“It’s not a mystery. What is lacking is the political leadership to get behind some of these ideas and to educate the public,” Essig said.
The last attempt to avoid the politically risky tax increase for roads legislators passed the buck to voters in a 2012 statewide referendum that failed spectacularly in most regions of the state. Business leaders don’t want funding derailed again by another referendum.
“We’re strongly of the opinion that legislators were elected to make tough decisions,” Millican said.
The chairman of the House Transportation Committee told legislators Monday during a conference at the University of Georgia that whatever methods are used to raise the added money will require a stiff backbone from them.
“I know that it’s one that is going to give some people heartburn,” said Roberts, R-Ocilla.
Roberts, and his Senate counterpart Steve Gooch, R-Dahlonega, led a joint committee studying funding choices through eight field hearings around the state in search of options, or that elusive, silver bullet.
Hearings in Columbus and Augusta provided the opportunity for residents to voice unique concerns since those communities border states with lower gas taxes. They are also were in two of the three regions that passed the 2012 sales-tax increase regionally for transportation improvements.
Legislators from those three regions don’t want their constituents to be penalized or to pay extra taxes to fix roads for people in other parts of the state — namely metro Atlanta — who wouldn’t tax themselves. The Transportation Alliance doesn’t want that either, but it hasn’t figured out a way to avoid it.
Most observers believe 2015 is the best opportunity, politically speaking to raise more transportation revenue. It’s not an election year. The governor just got re-elected, so he’s at the height of his popularity and hasn’t yet become a lame duck. And the public generally accepts the need to improve the roads now.
However, there are some who downplay the need for painful tax hikes and political risks.
One is Gov. Nathan Deal who told 700 business representatives and politicians Tuesday at the annual Transportation Summit at the Athens Classic Center not to panic about the size of the need.
“I’m not so sure that those are accurate estimates. I cited CNBC, which says we have the best road and bridge system in the country,” he said. “We know we have deficits, but on a comparative basis, maybe we should not be condemning ourselves too severely.”
When asked by reporters about the political risk to legislators who had run on a pledge not to raise taxes, he said first that the levy on gasoline should be thought of as a user fee instead. Later, he said, “I think there are ways we can do that without necessarily increasing what might be perceived as a gas tax.”
He didn’t offer any further hints about what he has in mind.
Another crucial player not calling for a gas-tax boost is the Georgia Public Policy Foundation, a market-oriented think tank with the respect of GOP leaders. The foundation assembled a recipe that includes tolls on new roads and added express lanes, annual fees for electric cars and some accounting changes.
The accounting shifts may avoid a vote on a tax increase for legislators, but it’s not without pain. It would eliminate the exemption for government vehicles from the gas tax and dedicate the so-called “fourth penny” to transportation instead of it going into the state’s general fund as it has since the state increased the sales tax on all purchases from three pennies per dollar to four.
Moving money from the general fund to transportation could put a crimp on other parts of the budget, like education, healthcare and law enforcement, warns Essig of the competing Budget & Policy Institute.
“The cure for that is raising additional funds to pay for transportation,” he said. “The biggest mistake we could make is raiding the general fund.”
But Kelly McCutcheon, president of the Public Policy Foundation, disagrees, arguing that the state’s improving economy is increasing overall tax collections enough to fill the hole left by the accounting shifts.
“If they don’t act quickly, that money will be spoken for,” he said.
He also calls for halting the sales tax on gasoline that cities, counties and school boards impose, forcing them to make other provisions.
“We’ll know that what we’re paying at the pump goes to transportation,” he said, predicting it would restore the public’s trust that taxes will be spent as promised.
According to McCutcheon, raising the gas tax would be a temporary fix because the ever-improving efficiency of vehicles results in reduced gas consumption. A better option is to tax vehicles per miles driven, as Oregon has begun doing.
One area where all of the experts agree is that the political leaders need to get in gear soon. Roberts said the yearend report of the committee’s field hearings will only be a list of options, not a proposal. And Deal said he is waiting on that report.
Observers sense that the committee is deferring to the governor who is deferring to the committee.
“It’s December. It seems like now would be the time to lay the groundwork,” McCutcheon said. “If there’s a grand plan, they’ve done a grand job of keeping it under wraps.”
Follow Walter Jones on Twitter @MorrisNews and Facebook or contact him at walter.jones@morris.com.
