Michigan, home of Big Three automakers Ford, GM and Chrysler, has long had the worst roads in the country, an irony which hasn’t been lost on those living here.
Last year, after a long, contentious debate, the completely GOP-controlled state legislature passed an utterly preposterous “road repair” law to purportedly fix the problem by…
The Republican “plan” raises gas taxes by 7.3 cents per gallon and vehicle registration fees by 20% over a year from now (January 2017), raising $600 million annually. The remaining $600 million will come directly out of the state budget in mystery cuts over the next six years so that the revenues it will generate by cutting vital education, public safety, and other essential programs won’t be fully available until much later. In other words, the “plan” raises only $452 million in the first year it takes effect (2017) and $608 million in the second year of the $1.2 billion needed annually for road funding, and won’t reach $1.2 billion in annual funds until fiscal year 2021. On top of all this, Republicans attempted to deflect criticism by putting in a provision to expand the Homestead Tax Credit which blows an additional $200 million hole in the budget.
It essentially ties the hands of future legislators unless they pass more laws to mitigate the devastation it causes. By the time the real pain is inflicted and we are left to slash our state budget by $800 million a year, the current cohort of lawmakers will be long gone.
Outrageous, right? It hurts children, the poor, etc. while only partially fixing the road repair issue.
In the meantime, the state, county and local roads continue to crumble, causing massive safety issues and costly auto repairs as we bob & weave our way over our pothole-laden streets.
Just to give you a quick example, here’s some footage of Lahser Road, which runs right through my neck of the woods…and this actually isn’t that bad. Remember, this is road is in one of the wealthiest areas of the state; you can imagine how much worse off roads in the poorer areas are:
However, that isn’t the asinine law I’m talking about in the headline. This one is:
Oakland County, MI — Bloomfield Township, one of Michigan’s most affluent communities, won’t pay a cent for the $1 billion plan to rebuild and widen Interstate 75 through Oakland County.
About 20 minutes away in Troy, taxpayers will fork over $9.6 million between now and 2024 to support the project.
Sound fair?
...The reason some communities pay and others don’t is found buried in a 1951 law that requires cities and villages with at least 25,000 residents to chip in local funding to support Michigan Department of Transportation road projects. Bloomfield Township isn’t either, and neither is Oakland County, which is responsible for major roads.
I live in Bloomfield Township. It has 41,000 residents, but since it’s a Township, not a City or Village, we get off the hook.
The district I’m running for also does include 2 Cities, Bloomfield Hills and Birmingham...except that Bloomfield Hills only has 4,000 people, while Birmingham comes in under the threshold with a population of about 20,000.
Not only do the 65,000 people in my district (OK, more like 61,000; there’s a tiny chunk of Bloomfield Township which is in a different district) get off scott-free, this law takes money away from local (desperately needed) road repair in other cities/villages...
John LaMacchia of the Michigan Municipal League, which also wants to see the legislation repealed, said the formula takes local road money away to pay for MDOT work.
...while simultaneously forcing them to help pay for the I-75 expansion:
Officials in Troy and neighboring Royal Oak have adopted city resolutions that oppose the I-75 widening project, not only because of the costs, but also because it makes it too easy for motorists to bypass local communities.
I have mixed feelings about the project itself. It’s been in the works for a long time, and includes things like HOV lanes, soundwalls and safety improvements, so there’s plenty of arguments to be made either way. Plus, construction has already started, so I’m pretty sure the time for that debate has long since passed:
So, it’s really about the funding of the project (and similar ones), not the project itself.
The good news is that, according to the Detroit News, just about everyone else, even the GOP legislators, seem to agree that this is a stupid law...
Knollenberg [that would be Republican State Senator Marty] sponsored legislation that would end the city match requirement for state highway construction projects, which he called an “additional MDOT tax” for the 45 Michigan communities that meet the 25,000-resident population threshold, from Detroit to Inkster.
The repeal proposal sailed through the House and Senate in a series of unanimous votes and is headed to Gov. Rick Snyder…
...except for one rather obvious problem:
...whose transportation officials oppose the legislation because they estimate it would eliminate $22 million in funding for state trunk line projects already planned for the next five years.
“Obviously if we’ve got to come up with an extra ($22 million) over the next five years, it has to come from somewhere,” MDOT legislative adviser Phil Browne said during committee testimony on the bill.
“Some of these major projects aren’t just going to go away, but that money’s going to come from someplace else to make up for it.”
Yes, that’s right: Kudos to Knollenberg et al for getting rid of an unfair tax for the local communities...but cutting taxes is the easy part for Republicans. It’s the other half of the equation which always seems to bewilder them. From the Detroit News article:
State road revenue is set to increase as new laws raising gas taxes and registration fees are phased in starting at the beginning of next year through 2021.
Local roads are generally in worse shape than highways, according to data from the Michigan Transportation Asset Management Council...
“With new revenues about to be phased in, it’s not going to be much of a hardship (on MDOT) in the grand scheme of things” if it is repealed, he said.
...except that, as I noted at the beginning of this diary, the new “road repair” law is only projected to raise 38% of the $1.2 billion already needed to maintain Michigan’s roads next year and 51% of the necessary funding in 2018...while doing so by further starving other vital state services. Tacking another $22 million onto that $1.2 billion would bump up needed funds by another 2% or so.
Of course, if Snyder and the state GOP hadn’t slashed corporate taxes by $1.8 billion a few years back…
Anyway, technically speaking, killing the current road repair cost-sharing law wouldn’t cost anyone in my district more, it would simply remove the burden on the other communities as well...but killing it without replacing the lost revenue via a more fair funding mechanism doesn’t help the situation either.
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I’m running for Oakland County Commissioner here in Mitt Romney’s hometown. Any assistance you could provide would be greatly appreciated!
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In addition, please help out Nicole Bedi, running for State Representative here in Michigan’s 40th state House seat!
(in fact, if you can only spare a donation for one of us, please donate to her campaign instead of mine; while I obviously want to win my own race, retaking the state house is more important!)