GOP plan to limit transit funding is rejected
A Republican plan for a Valley-wide transportation tax that would eliminate some transit funding hit a dead end Monday, as a Senate panel rejected a revised bill that could fund road and bus projects, but would bar any money for light rail.
Sen. Frank Carroll, R-Sun City West, cast the deciding "no" vote when he joined with Democrats, saying he hopes the House of Representatives can come up with a better proposal. A previous version of the defeated measure would have eliminated money for bus operations, but it was amended.
The 3-4 vote came despite admonitions from committee chairman and bill sponsor Sen. David Farnsworth, R-Mesa, that failure to pass Senate Bill 1122 would kill any chance of getting the legislative OK this year on a transportation tax.
Maricopa County is the only county in the state that needs legislative approval to go to its voters with a transportation tax. Regional officials want to put an extension of Proposition 400, a halfcent sales tax, on the November 2024 ballot. The tax is due to expire at the end of 2025.
“Our request is a simple one: Let us put this measure before the voters," said Kenn Weise, chairman of the Maricopa Association of Governments and mayor of Avondale.
But the regional plan's support for bus and light rail transportation was a non-starter for key members of the Senate Transportation and Technology Committee.
Farnsworth instead proposed SB 1122 to put a heavy emphasis on freeways and arterial roads, leaving 5% for transit. Although he boosted the percentage share for transit to 20%, the bill still lacked any funding for light rail.
The staunch opposition to the rail component came from Farnsworth, Sen. Anthony Kern, R-Glendale, and Sen. Jake Hoffman, R-Queen Creek.
Hoffman, an outspoken critic of the Valley's light rail system, said his constituents in the southeast Valley don't use rail, and bus service is rare.
Most people want to use their cars, he said, so the plan should skew heavily to roads and freeways without any obligation to contribute to federally driven programs that would reduce carbon emissions by encouraging alternative means of transportation.
But supporters of the regional plan, the result of more than 400 meetings and 10,000-plus public comments, said it's important to have a plan that provides alternatives to single-vehicle use.
Failure to fund light rail expansion, which Proposition 400 has helped do, would "exponentially increase" traffic congestion and air pollution, said Jessica Mefford-Miller, CEO of Valley Metro, the regional transit authority.
Light rail has incentivized growth along its corridor, Mefford-Miller said.
"Balance means mass transit," said Mike Hutchinson, representing the East Valley Partnership, a business and community organization that promotes economic development. "We can’t decimate the system we built over the last 40 years," he said.
The half-cent transportation tax was first endorsed in 1985, when fed-up Valley commuters approved the hike to pay primarily for freeways. The tax was extended in 2004, widening its scope to support the Valley's growing bus network and early light-rail efforts.
Sen. Christine Marsh, D-Phoenix, voted no on the plan, saying it was arrogant of the committee to believe its plan for transportation was superior to the one developed over a series of years.