Transportation funding panel waiting for September
A blue-ribbon commission now studying ways to raise new money to finance transportation projects in Maryland is unlikely to have much to add to its previous recommendations before September.
A meeting of the Blue Ribbon Commission on Transportation Funding in Annapolis Tuesday produced nothing in the way of new decision-making. Members discussed the slim results of this year's legislative session and heard a briefing on a statewide development plan being drafted by the O'Malley administration but signaled that any new recommendations to the General Assembly would wait until fall.
The panel recommended during this year's legislative session that legislators take steps to raise the state's 23.5-cent-a-gallon gas tax and insulate the Transportation Trust Fund from future "raids" to balance the general fund budget. With gas prices soaring during the session, legislators shied away from any increase in the gas tax, which has remained level since 1992, but provided a modest amount of new money in the form of fee increases. The Assembly also adopted some mild safeguards against future diversions of transportation money -- though nothing that couldn't be undone by a majority vote in both Houses.
The main decision facing the panel now is whether to recommend to the O'Malley administration whether to push the issue of transportation funding in a special session of the Assembly this fall or to wait for the next annual session next January.
That decision could hinge on the price of gasoline as fall approaches. On Wednesday the average price of regular gasoline in Maryland edged past $4 for the first time since 2008, but there have been recent signs that the market may be nearing a peak.
Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller has signaled he is ready to take on the issue, urging Gov. Martin O'Malley to take up the transportation issue as part of the special session that must be called to deal with redistricting.
Democratic Sen. Rob Garagiola, a commission member from Montgomery County, said he believes the gas tax must be increased to deal with the state's growing backlog of transportation needs. But he conceded that it's a hard sell when prices are at peak levels.
"The reality is that it makes it more difficult when your constituents are clamoring about the high price of gas," he said. "If gas is high, it'll make it more challenging to get the votes."
For the state, the dilemma is that high gas prices don't just make it more difficult to raise new revenue. When prices are high, consumers tend to cut back on driving and use less fuel -- cutting into collections.
In 2007, O'Malley proposed an indexing scheme that would have automatically increased the gas tax when the cost of road construction increased, but the Assembly rejected the idea.
In addition to taxation, the commission is expected to make recommendations on other financing options including public-private partnerships and methods of "capturing" a portion of the value added for developers when a transportation project is completed. However, those matters could involve complex legislation, and some legislators who are members of the commission warned against bringing complex proposals into a relatively short special session.
