Roads and Transportation

By Fred Strong

Every effort must be pursued to bring funding back to what it was for the safety and economic opportunities of our society.

Transportation Improvements: Traffic congestion must be reduced through better neighborhood design including more alternatives for getting places by motor vehicle, bicycle and walking. Present arterial and highway connections must be improved and made more efficient. We are currently working toward achieving that. It is a work in progress that will take years of diligent effort as our economy allows the necessary Federal, State and local funding to increase.

Street Maintenance Funding: The State's financial woes have provided an excuse for the Governor and Legislature to remove most of the road maintenance funding for local jurisdictions like Paso Robles. This, combined with polarization at the Congressional level, has reduced funding to the point where our streets are not sustainable without additional revenues from a source other than our property taxes. This City Council is doing all that it can to prevent the failure of our transportation infrastructure. I am, personally, seeking to bring back home more of our State and Federal tax money to achieve this purpose.

The Bigger Picture!

LIMITED GOAL: The transportation system for our city must integrate well into the region and state in all its aspects. Roads, highways, freeways, rail and air infrastructure must each be prepared to carry freight and people to wherever they must go in a safe and efficient manner. The same infrastructure is used for transporting people and freight. The capacity must be sufficient for both in order to have a healthy environment and vibrant economy. Improvements must take all aspects of travel into consideration and appropriate funding must be provided within a traditional format, which means that transportation pays for its own infrastructure on an equitable basis through fuel taxes, license fees and Federal Government funding for federal military needs and basic national policy implementation.

STEETS, ROADS AND HIGHWAYS

These funds have been available in the past until the State of California decided to "raid" local revenues to pay for the State's overspending. In transportation that included removing the local share of all state fuel sales taxes by changing the tax base. It left a "balance" owed from previous "borrowing" without any designated pay-back time. Through four years of constant badgering of the State for return of this money I have been able, through my positions with the League of California Cities and my leadership on the San Luis Obispo Council Of Governments, to get the State to begin paying that money back as of this year past year to a small extent. This fiscal year we will have about $1.2 million returned to us, of which $0.5 million is designated for specific on-going maintenance. Of the remainder we are already in process of re- striping many major roads and preventing the failure of three segments of roads within our city. The balance of about $0.5 million will be used to repair the most critical areas of our streets until a more stable source of money is established to bring everything up to standard. To do so, at the local level, we will have to use non- traditional funding sources for transportation, such as a general sales tax increase. The State has preempted the field of fuel taxes which leaves us on the outside looking in. I will continue to work to reinstate our previous position in transportation based funding for transportation needs.We do, and will continue to, work with Cal-Trans on our local road interface with state roads, highways and freeways. A few weeks ago another effort of ours came to fruition for us to receive $500,000 to improve Union Road through the use of specially designated bicycle path funds for that purpose. We will have to use some of our available money for a partial match of funds. That money is set aside and available.

RAIL

In rail I am working, as a member of the Board of Directors of the rail authority on the Pacific Surf-liner Corridor (LOSSAN), to become self- governing without being under the "wing" of Cal-Trans since the Governor cut 80% of the staffing for rail this year. Funding for rail comes primarily from self-generated funds (ticket and food service income) with Federal and State subsidies for the balance of cost. The infrastructure is provided by the freight rail companies and we lease time on those rails. They need to be improved and increased for more capacity. I propose to do this by getting a reconsideration of the the spending priorities between "high speed passenger rail" and current city- to-city rail corridor infrastructure, where we already have the right-of- way for expansion.

It has already been determined that, should it proceed, the proposed high speed rail project will use $6 billion to go from Los Angeles Union Station to Anaheim, almost solely for the benefit of Disneyland. It is also known that existing local and city-to-city rail would only lengthen the passengers' trip for that distance by 10 minutes. $6 billion to save 10 minutes is foolish! That $6 billion is sufficient to double and triple track nearly the entire present city-to-city rail system throughout the state on existing rights-of- way and shorten current rail travel times by up to 30%. To me, this makes more sense. The money mentioned above would also allow the plans of the Coast Rail Coordinating Committee (CRCC) to come to fruition. As an alternate on that Board of Directors I am working to that end and, if I'm successful, we will have two additional trains stopping in Paso Robles daily.

AIR

At our airport we currently serve general aviation (private aircraft), CalFire (for borate bombers) and the military (for summer exercises at Camp Roberts) as well as many local businesses and organizations. We need to develop a freight operations component at our airport, since two efforts at commercial passenger airline travel have previously failed to generate enough traffic for success. Nearly all improvements to the infrastructure at our airport have been provided by Federal funding based in part upon national security purposes. We need to step up to the plate and go the extra mile as funding becomes available.

BRINGING IT TOGETHER

Our local surface transportation system is integrally connected with the region, state and nation for long distance freight and passenger travel. Locally, we need alternate and parallel routes to the highway system for motorized vehicles as well as non- motorized trails for those who prefer a personally healthy, less intrusive life style. That system has already been planned and is being implemented in segments as money becomes available.

Internationally we are connected by rail and highway with the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles which currently process close to 80% of all Pacific Rim imports and transport them to their destinations throughout the United States by truck and train. The I-10 and I-80 are too impacted to accept much additional freight and still accommodate passenger vehicles. For east/ west transport that leaves only the 46/41 to the I-5 route from the coast through the 101 connection. The Los Angeles basin transportation infrastructure contains 16 of the 40 most congested locations in the United States. We are the next, most natural outlet for overflow freight truck traffic. The only other alternative is to expand the rail capacity throughout California to carry the freight. This will also increase capacity and availability of passenger rail transportation with a reduction by up to 30% in travel time (San Luis Obispo to San Diego). The doubling in size of the Panama Canal already has Asia gearing up to increase its exports by $200 billion a year creating over 1.2 million jobs in the United States. Our freight capacity and export capabilities will determine how much of this economic development takes place in California. Due to this known, and obvious, potential impact to Paso Robles I am committed to plan and prepare to accommodate the economic expansion, create alternate local routes and protect our semi-rural lifestyle and culture while accepting the economic advantages of the increased activity.

Additional Local Detail:

Since 1935 we have relied on the State's commitment to use taxes derived from transportation for transportation. The gas and fuel taxes, vehicle License fees and truck weight fees funded the vast bulk of highway, streets, bridges, rail and trail maintenance, repair and development. We did not dedicate any other fees to these things because they weren't necessary unless they entailed new, special, high cost safety or enhancement projects. In the 21st Century we received a rude awakening when the State started "borrowing" our road money for totally unrelated purposes. In 2004 the State just took 25% of the money and proposed repaying us by taking the money away from schools. Repayment to the schools was to come from the State's General Fund which had already been committed to that by Proposition 98 approved by the voters. It was a sham solution for a State take away.

Next the State redefined transportation uses to include funds for police enforcement of traffic laws and it took the road repair money from vehicle license fees and gave it to "grants" for special police projects. Competitive grants always favor the "big five" cities in California and leave us holding a dirty bag.

We fought, I fought, you passed a proposition to protect local funds from State take-aways. It protected the funds but not the source of the funds. The next attack was upon the one area left to repair and maintain streets and roads because their deterioration causes blight. The State removed Redevelopment Agency funds by eliminating Redevelopment Agencies. No more Agency ... no more funds.

Meanwhile, our previous ability to create necessary tax formulae to pay costs of maintenance and repair were removed first by Proposition 13 and various amendments thereto. Then fees were also taken away by Proposition 218. City Councils no longer had any way to create the funds necessary to do their job. We MUST fight the State and Federal governments to restore some or all of the funding we need to maintain what we are required to provide. I do that for the City of Paso Robles. I am the only present Council Member who has acquired the functional positions to be able to do that.

I have been responsible for over $100 million in funds returned to our area for that purpose in the past six years. I am currently involved in acquiring between $96 million and $2 billion of your tax money to be returned to the local area to meet our needs.

Factual Assessment:

While there are many opinions and personal observations about the state of our streets and roads, it is necessary to have factual information in order to make responsible decisions. The latest study figures are from 2009 and appear in the Federal Transportation Improvement Program 2013.

Paso Robles has more miles of local streets and roads than any other city in the county. 151 miles compared to 144 for Atascadero and 124 for San Luis Obispo. However, maintenance funds that are available are distributed based upon population not road miles. I spite of receiving the least money per mile of road among that group we still have only an average percentage of roads in "bad" and "fair" condition. We have 20% fewer road miles in "poor" condition and we have 12% more roads in "good" and "excellent" condition than the average for this area.

On a factual basis Paso Robles is doing a good job with what it has. Still, we want to catch up and bring all of our streets and roads up to a high standard. That will take $3 million a year plus the money to make up for shortfalls from State take-aways over the past half dozen years. We can do that IF the voters give us the funds to do so. If not I will still continue to seek as much State and Federal money as I can find and influence to come to Paso Robles. If the voters approve more funding I will still seek opportunities that will let us stretch the impact of those dollars as matching funds for additional State and Federal grants.

Our streets and roads move freight as well as people. They are an integral element of our economic recovery. That consideration must be given an appropriate weight in the calculations of when and where we spend scarce dollars for maintenance, repair and replacement.

During the last week of September I was appointed co-chairman of the Transportation Committe of the National Association of Regional Councils. That committee has significant impact upon Federal transportation programs, funding and their impact upon our future economic devalopment. In 2013 I will be gathering information from public workshops to be held in every major region of the United States and I'll be helping to draft a proposal for the next Federal Transportation Re-Authorization Act. Your help and your input are welcome.