O’Malley says new funding needed for transportation
Gov. Martin O’Malley made a case to Maryland’s business community that the state needs more money to fix roads and build new ones in a 15 minute speech to the Chamber of Commerce Wednesday night.
Outlining five “hard truths” about the state’s aging infrastructure and dwindling revenue sources, he appeared to be laying the groundwork for a package of tax and fee increases. Top lawmakers have speculated that the fall special session needed for congressional redistricting will include a fix to the transportation trust fund.
“I’d like to tell you bridges are like trees and if we left them alone they would grow taller and stronger, but it is not true,” O’Malley said. “He said he would “like to” be able to say that the state could “build a $90 million bridge for $10 million” but added “it does not work that way.”
During the 2007 special session, O'Malley proposed an gas tax that would rise on an index, but he noted that the idea was not popular. The governor reminded the audience that there is a cost to inaction -- 495, he said, is like a parking lot. A region known for snarled traffic will not be able to attract new companies, he argued.
He also said that tolls will raise. The money is needed to pay for the widening of I-95 in Baltimore County and the Inter County Connector in the DC suburbs.
William T. Riley, Jr., the new chairman of the Maryland Chamber, spoke briefly after the governor and asked him not to a wide array of taxes during the special session, when the rules are different and bills move much more quickly through the legislative process.
Comments
I wish that O'Malley tree analogy was expended to include his belief that taxpayer money grows on trees. See, MD spends almost 1/3 of every dollar brought in from the gas tax to maintain, operate or build mass transit. The problem is the more successful you are at encouraging new ridership on mass transit the less total money you have. It's an inverse fiscal relationship.
If Maryland wants to fix their transportation woes then I would suggest first a Constitutional Amendment that forbids raiding the transportation trust fund for any purposes and/or borrowing against the TTF. Second, increasing mass transit costs to require riders pay at 3/4 if not 80% of the cost of their rides (otherwise known as farebox recovery). Third, an independent study of best practices for road management and spending to forbid the casual wasting of nearly $1 million for a book about MD's road histories.
Posted by: CEA | May 4, 2011 10:34 PM
What CEA said. (he beat me to it!)
Do any of those five truths include the practice of stealing transportation funds (since forever) to patch up holes in the general budget?
Is there any indication that additional funds allegedly set aside for transportation projects will actually be used ONLY for these?
Without these protections?
Not one single penny.
Posted by: MrRational | May 5, 2011 8:27 AM
MOM pilloried Ehrlich for raiding the Transportation funds in the 2006 election and now due to his fiscal mismanagement he emptied the transportaion funds instead of cutting spending. Now he has the gall to pontificate to Marylanders about this?Where is the outrage?
Marylanders are just supposed to gleefully pony up even more cash because of MOM's foolish tax and spend ways?
Posted by: john | May 5, 2011 12:12 PM
Yet another reason why a single-party state is a great idea. I think O'Malley and his Democratic legislator lapdogs can continue to count on Maryland voters who have the attention span of a gnat.
Posted by: Gringomike | May 7, 2011 10:41 PM