fixourroadswv

By BILL LUSK

HD Media

LOGAN – Voters in West Virginia will take to the polls on October 7 to have their final say on the “2017 Roads to Prosperity” road bond referendum.

Gov. Jim Justice’s proposed plan includes 600 road projects that could total as many as 48,000 jobs, bringing hope to West Virginia.

“We have a real opportunity to create real life jobs that brings employment to our state like crazy,” Justice said during the opening ceremonies of West Virginia Route 10 in Logan last week. “We can really bring people to West Virgina. Bring manufacturers, bring tourism, bring jobs and bring hope.”

If passed by voters, the state could sell billions in road bonds paid for via a gas tax increase, motor vechicles sales tax and higher DMV fees.

One misconception of the proposed bill is that it will raise taxes for residents of West Virginia. Justice said that is misleading and everything is already in place.

“There is no truth to that whatsoever,” Justice said. “Your taxes will not change in any way, shape or fashion. Everything is in place, everything is ready to go.”

Not everyone is on board with Justice’s plan, as the West Virginia Republican Party is opposing the road bond. By a vote of 99-1, the GOP executive committee voted against the plan much to the disappointment of Justice.

“It’s not good, because I think what happened there was that you had a couple of people who were standing up and all of a sudden the whole herd ran the way they were wanting to go,” Justice said. “We need everybody on the same page.”

According to Transportation Secretary Tom Smith, safety improvements could be completed in the next two-to-four years that would fix old roads, pave potholes and help build new roads.

Of the specific projects, a proposed $15 million would go toward improvements along WV 10 between US 119 and I-64 in Cabell, Lincoln and Logan Counties. The King Coal Highway would see a proposed $40 million that would construct a four-lane highway connecting Horsepen Mountain to Gilbert Creek in Mingo County.

Other projects include a proposed four-lane highway stretching from WV 16 in Wyoming County to Welch that would cost an estimated $110 million and operational improvements of approximately 69 miles of existing facilities in Logan, Mercer and Wyoming counties, carrying an estimated $15.5 million. In all the two phase project would cover 25 different counties totaling $2.9 billion.

“Oct. 7 is an important day and this is our chance,” Justice said. “It is a vision that will take us somewhere but I got to have everyone’s help. Failing to pass this would be the craziest thing we could ever do.”

History shows that West Virginians have had mixed results in regards to previous road bonds.

Of the five previous road bonds, only two (1973 and 1996) were passed while three (1981, 1984 and 1986) were rejected by the voters. Despite the mix bag Justice feels confident that the voters of West Virginia will make the right decision.

Publication: WV Gazette-Mail
Release Date: February 11 2016

By Phil Kabler

Used to be, the state Court of Claims paid out an average of 700 to 800 claims a year for vehicles damaged because of poor road conditions, Clerk of the Court Cheryle Hall said Thursday.

Last year, those claims jumped to 1,018, and this year, hit 1,250 claims, Hall said.

She said the spike in claims is directly attributable to deteriorating road conditions statewide.

“I would say the bulk of these claims are for holes in the road,” she told the Senate Finance Committee.

Once the Court of Claims bill (SB 515) passes the Legislature, the state will pay $983,000 to those 1,250 claimants, an amount Hall said is kept down because the court generally awards payment only for the claimant’s auto insurance deductible.

“That’s why there’s a lot of $250, $1,000 claims,” she said.

However, Sen. Craig Blair, R-Berkeley, suggested the law is being abused, as more drivers are made aware the state will pay for vehicle damage.

“You want to know the reason the numbers are going up? Because the message is going up,” he said.

Blair recounted an incident last summer, when he blew a tire after hitting a pothole. While changing the tire, he said a driver pulled up and told him, “You know, the state will pay for that.”

“We can’t have every pothole fixed everywhere all the time,” Blair said of the vehicle damage claims. “I can’t see how it’s a burden of the state and the taxpayers.”

However, Hall responded, “It’s the failure of the state to maintain its roads. It’s not the claimants’ fault.” West Virginians for Better Transportation, a group advocating for increased state spending on road maintenance and construction, estimates state drivers spend $400 million a year on vehicle repairs resulting from poor road conditions.

In a related matter, the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday discussed a resolution (SJR 6) for a proposed amendment to the state Constitution that, if approved by voters, would authorize the sale of up to $2 billion in state road bonds.

The resolution states that the Legislature is to enact a state tax sufficient to pay off the bonds in 25 years, but provides no specifics.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles Trump, R-Morgan, lead sponsor of the resolution, said he did not have any specific taxes in mind to retire the bonds.

“My attitude on this — me personally — is I’d be willing to look at almost any reasonable option,” he said.

Among the recommendations issued last May, the Governor’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Highways proposed a $1 billion road bond issue, to be paid off by retaining tolls on the West Virginia Turnpike through 2049. Currently, the tolls are set to expire when the $300 million bond issue issued in 1989 is retired in 2019.

The resolution requires a two-thirds passage vote in both houses in order to become a ballot referendum.

Trump said he brought up the resolution, which was not acted on Thursday, to “take the temperature” of the level of interest in the Senate for pursuing bonds to fund state roads.

Toll plazas on the West Virginia Turnpike, like this one at Sharon, could be a thing of the past in 2019, but some state leaders think West Virginia should keep the tolls going and use the money to help maintain other highways.

As the Senate Transportation Committee advanced a bill Tuesday to keep tolls on the West Virginia Turnpike (SB 397), one senator said it is well past time for the state to have a plan for transportation funding.

“Our roads are so horrible out there right now, we better come up with a comprehensive plan that looks at everything,” said Sen. Robert Plymale, D-Wayne.

Plymale said other states have taken the lead on funding their highways, including Ohio, which adopted Access Ohio, a $3 billion program to complete 41 major road projects, funded through a small increase in tolls on the Ohio Turnpike.

“We’ve got the Ohio plan. We’ve got a number of other examples of what we should be doing,” he said. “If we’re going to do this, let’s do it right and look at what Ohio and other states have done.”

Plymale noted that nothing has come of the Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Highways, which conducted an extensive study of state road funding issues, and released its recommendations last May.

That commission concluded that West Virginia needs to be spending an additional $750 million a year to adequately maintain its roadways, and an additional $380 million a year to complete proposed highway construction projects within a reasonable time.

Essentially, that would require doubling current annual spending on state highways.

The commission proposed about $141 million a year in new revenue through a variety of fee increases, and Plymale was lead sponsor of a bill last year that would have enacted those increases. The bill was never taken up.

He said Tuesday that constituents are irate that nothing is being done to fix the state’s deteriorating roadways.

“They’re pretty upset [that] there’s been no effort to look at a long-term fix for road maintenance or any new construction,” he said.

“If we’re going to diversify our economy, one of the elements you have to have is a transportation system that can move goods efficiently,” Plymale added, noting that the highway serving the new Heartland Intermodal Gateway at Prichard, U.S. 52, is in need of major upgrades.

The centerpiece of the Blue Ribbon Commission’s recommendations was a $1 billion road bond issue, to be paid by continuing tolls on the Turnpike through 2049.

Under existing law, tolls on the Turnpike are to expire in May 2019, when the $300 million road bond issued in 1989 is paid off.

The bill advanced Tuesday would keep tolls on the Turnpike after the bonds are retired in May, retaining a source of revenue that provides $85 million a year, more than 75 percent of which is paid by out-of-state travelers and trucking companies.

Committee members received copies of a resolution adopted by the Parkways Authority encouraging the Legislature to keep tolls on the Turnpike, citing the potential loss of revenue, as well as the loss of as many as 360 full- and part-time jobs.

Committee members Tuesday adopted an amendment by Sen. Bob Beach, D-Monongalia, that would cap funding for maintenance and operations of the Turnpike at $55 million a year, despite concerns raised by Brian Helmick, the Parkways Authority’s bond counsel.

Helmick advised that federal highways regulations generally require that all toll revenue be spent on the toll road or on routes that feed into the toll road.

“You can’t just, carte blanche, direct the state to use these monies,” he said.

If the bill passes the Senate, its fate in the House of Delegates is uncertain. House Roads and Transportation Chairman Marty Gearhart, R-Mercer, attended Tuesday’s meeting, but did not address the committee.

Gearhart is lead sponsor of a bill (HB 4222) that outlines the dismantling of the Parkways Authority after the Turnpike bonds are retired, and has said retaining tolls on the Turnpike would be “a broken promise to the people of Southern West Virginia.”

Also Tuesday, committee members reviewed a memorandum from West Virginia University law professor Bob Bastress for options to give state residents a discount on Turnpike tolls without violating the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution.

Among the options: Increasing motor vehicle registration fees to cover the costs of Turnpike tolls paid by state residents.

Under the option, which Bastress estimated would increase registration fees by about $6.40 a year for passenger vehicles up to about $25 for large trucks, vehicle owners would receive a special EZ-Pass transponder that would not charge for passing through toll barriers.

Publication: Clarksburg Exponent

Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin’s State of the State address on Wednesday evening had a huge, gapping hole in it — or, in more appropriate terms, a gaping pothole — because he didn’t even mention addressing the State Road Fund.

By the end of this legislative session, it will have been three years since the governor first appointed the Blue-Ribbon Highway Commission to identify issues, needs and recommendations to address West Virginia’s rapidly deteriorating roads and bridges.

It has been over a year since the Blue-Ribbon Highway Commission’s findings were made public. The commission identified the need for the state Legislature to increase current funding levels by a staggering $1 billion a year just to maintain the current roads and bridges, plus finish highway projects already in progress such as Corridor H.

The scapegoat for the past two years has been Congress’ failure to approve new funding for the federal Highway Trust Fund. Congress finally did so in August, and West Virginia fared well, receiving $2.3 billion over the next five-year funding cycle.

Without that obstacle, all eyes were on Gov. Tomblin’s office to develop and propose a solution for the under-funded State Road Fund.

State residents and legislators alike fully expected that the governor would finally address this issue during his 2016 State of the State address, as well as in the 2017 fiscal-year budget proposal he delivers to both the Senate and House leadership at the conclusion of his speech.

Sadly, it didn’t occur.

The governor and Legislature have been kicking this can down the road for far too long. The problem is that, as each year passes, the condition of our state’s roads and bridges deteriorates even more, which means it will cost even more to repair or replace them as time goes on.

It appears that Gov. Tomblin, who is now in his last year in office, has decided to leave the massive problem to his successor. This will increase the cost of road and bridge repairs, and it will force state residents to absorb the costs of extensive repairs to their personal vehicles — to the tune of $333 per vehicle on average.

We implore our lawmakers to come up with a bipartisan plan during this legislative session, since no such plan has been forthcoming from the governor.

Besides fixing the state’s roads and bridges, we can think of at least two other economic benefits that would come from finding a way to fund more road maintenance and construction heading into this year’s paving season.

First, the state’s unemployment rate of 6.5 percent is the highest in the nation, and funding more road construction is an opportunity to put thousands of people to work —especially laid-off coal miners.

Second, quality highway infrastructure is a top priority for practically every business, manufacturer and job creator in determining where they are going to locate and invest in new facilities. After considering the conditions of West Virginia’s roads and the lack of a plan to fix them, most corporate executives are likely to select locations where roads are an asset, not a liability.

Let’s hope that in this election year, state legislators stand up and prove they deserve to be re-elected by showing they have the leadership necessary to address one of the state’s biggest problems — the State Road Fund.