Our View: Finding our way to better roads will be tough

We expect a lot of arguments about how we’re going to pay to fix California’s deplorable roads. But no one will argue we don’t need to fix them.

A study by the League of Cities, California State Association of Counties and several others put the price tag for those fixes at $59 billion. For perspective, the new state budget will spend $113 billion for all of California’s other needs this year.

How California’s roads got in such bad shape is a question with many answers – recession, diverted resources, too little federal help, overuse, etc. How we fix them is also a question with many answers, but it’s unlikely any will achieve consensus.

Some Republicans want to fix them without raising any taxes. Some Democrats want to raise vehicle license fees, registration fees and gas taxes.

In truth, without extra money we won’t get far. So the Legislative Analyst’s Office has provided several options:

▪ Raise $150 million a year by increasing the excise tax on gas by a penny.

▪ Add $1 to the annual vehicle registration fees, generating $33 million.

▪ Doubling weight fees, generating $1 billion.

▪ A 1 percent bump in vehicle license fees to generate $3 billion to $3.5 billion a year.

Then the question becomes how that money should be allocated. Eighty-one percent of the state’s roads belong to cities and counties. There are 20 self-help counties that already have higher sales taxes dedicated to caring for their roads. In those counties, the roads are actually quite a bit better.

San Joaquin is one of those. The study gave each county a single-number rating; above 70 is good, below 50 is poor. San Joaquin is a 73. For example, of the county’s 323 bridges, 92 (or 28 percent) need either repair or replacing. Of Stanislaus County’s 247 bridges, more than 50 percent need work. In Merced County it’s 44 percent, and in Tuolumne County it’s fully two-thirds. Interestingly, San Joaquin County has 6,807 miles of roads and the only place where they’re rated “poor” is Escalon.

Here’s where the fairness comes in. Since San Joaquin already taxes itself to fix the roads, should it have to pay even more in special state road taxes? Before that happens, shouldn’t counties that aren’t “self-help” be required to catch up? If they won’t tax themselves, perhaps an additional charge could be added to registration fees. Maybe drivers of bigger, heavier vehicles could pay more than those who drive lighter cars.

And what about drivers of electric or high-efficiency vehicles across the state? Their cars affect the roads as much as many others, but since they buy so little gas they’re getting a pass. One legislator suggested a $100 fee for electrics, but the governor is adamantly opposed (he drives a Prius, after all).

So the governor has called this special session to work it all out. And, as with the water bond last year, several of our local legislators are front and center. Sen. Anthony Cannella, R-Ceres, will sit as vice chair of the Senate committee. Sen. Tom Berryhill, R-Twain Harte, will be on one of three subcommittees. And Kristin Olsen, the Assembly’s Republican leader, is, as always, the face of the Republican plan, which would kill the bullet train and fire 3,500 state employees to find the money.

Stanislaus Supervisor Vito Chiesa, president of CSAC, spoke to the Legislature last week. He called this “pothole politics” and warned that ignoring the problem just tacks on another $6 billion a year.

We agree. But we can’t ignore the solutions, either – and they’re not going to be cheap.

This story was originally published July 3, 2015 at 10:24 AM with the headline "Our View: Finding our way to better roads will be tough."