Wednesday, July 09, 2008
Editorial: Back to Richmond; let the games resume
As Northern Virginia balks at imposing its own transportation taxes, any road fix looks more distant.
From the RoundTable blog
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Not just lawmakers but entire regions of Virginia now squabble over how to pay for urgent transportation needs without actually taking money out of any prospective voter's pocket -- or taking the rap for it, anyway.
Local officials in Northern Virginia don't want to carry that load for House Republicans, and they shouldn't have to.
Not when the transportation bill the GOP proposes balkanizes what should be a statewide system and ignores a glaring shortfall in the road maintenance budget for the entire state.
When lawmakers reconvene their special session on transportation today, they can expect to hear from a disgruntled group of NoVa elected officials, along with members of the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority and regional business and civic leaders.
Some of the contingent wrote to House and Senate leaders Monday, complaining the House Republicans' plan offers "an unacceptable solution for Northern Virginia." It would require local, elected government bodies to impose many of the taxes needed to pay for regional transportation projects.
That would leave those leaders to take the heat for raising taxes -- and face the peril that some of the localities might duck out.
Yet the Hampton Roads area, also beset by transportation needs, would be able to draw revenue from that generated by the growth in traffic at the Port of Virginia in Norfolk -- tax dollars that now go into the state's general fund. Localities in Hampton Roads would not have to impose major new taxes, NoVa officials complain, at the expense of Northern Virginia and the rest of the state. What's fair about that?
The state's transportation debate is sounding like a schoolyard squabble, hardly surprising given that the special session has been a giant game of tag from the start.
Gov. Tim Kaine called it to force anti-tax ideologues to compromise or be tagged clearly as obstructionists. House leaders responded by refusing to allow a vote on any statewide tax solution except the one voters are most likely to despise -- a Senate-passed gas tax increase.
Tag, you're it.
Virginia's economic future, meanwhile, hangs in the balance.
Republican Del. Phil Hamilton of Newport News said Tuesday he would offer a substitute for the House GOP bill, one that would require the state, not local governments, to impose the taxes and fees the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority needs.
That would satisfy only one of the NoVa leaders' objections -- if the GOP is willing to go even that far.
For his part, House Majority Leader Morgan Griffith of Salem said Monday he was sorry Northern Virginia officials had come out against the regional tax plan. Their opposition "is probably sufficient to kill the bill, but probably not sufficient to get what they want."
Tag, they're it.
Fun, huh?
