LG Bill Bolling hits it out of the park, laying out the failure of the Democrat-ick controlled State Senate to even pass common sense reforms that would have aided our transportation system.
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR BOLLING ON CONCLUSION OF TRANSPORTATION SPECIAL SESSION
RICHMOND – Early this morning, the Virginia General Assembly adjourned Sine Die, ending the Special Session on transportation that had convened on June 23rd. In response to this action, Lieutenant Governor Bill Bolling issued the following statement:
“I am very disappointed that the General Assembly was unable to make any meaningful progress toward addressing Virginia’s transportation challenges during this Special Session. The failure to do so does not reflect well on anyone involved in this process, and it leaves one of the major challenges facing Virginia unresolved.
“Unfortunately, much of the responsibility for this failure rests on the shoulders of Governor Kaine, who decided to call legislators back to Richmond without building any consensus around a possible transportation solution. In my judgment, the Governor’s decision to call the Special Session without first developing a framework for success was a mistake.
“In addition, Governor Kaine complicated the effort to find a transportation solution by introducing a transportation proposal that had very little, if any, support in the General Assembly. The Governor’s bill, which relied on massive statewide and regional tax increases, was not even supported by the members of his own party, and it was clearly not the right solution given the economic challenges that Virginia is currently facing.
“I am also disappointed that Democrats in the General Assembly systematically defeated common sense Republican proposals that would have helped us address Virginia’s long term transportation needs, at least in part. I was particularly disappointed that Democrats rejected legislation that would have:
- Directed potential revenues associated with offshore drilling in Virginia to transportation.
- Enabled Hampton Roads localities to keep the tax revenues derived from the Port of Virginia and use those revenues to fund transportation projects in their region of the state.
- Enabled Northern Virginia localities to keep the tax revenue derived from the Dulles International Airport and the Ronald Reagan International Airport and use those revenues to fund transportation projects in their region of the state.
- Amended the Constitution of Virginia to prohibit the use of transportation dollars to pay for other government programs without super majority approval of the members of the General Assembly
- Ordered an external management review of the Virginia Department of Transportation to make certain that our transportation dollars are being spent effectively and efficiently and directed to our state’s highest transportation priority – congestion relief.
“These were commonsense proposals that should have received widespread bipartisan support. By rejecting these proposals without serious consideration or debate, Democrats showed that they are unwilling to seriously consider any solution to our transportation challenges that do not involve higher taxes.
“Fortunately, the General Assembly meets every year, and we will have another chance to address this issue in January. It remains my hope that the members of the General Assembly will work to craft a transportation solution that relies on existing revenue sources and innovative transportation alternatives, not higher taxes.”
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That’s right, Senate Democrats wouldn’t even go for dedicating revenues generated from potential offshore drilling to transportation. This wasn’t even a vote for drilling, just where to direct revenues if it ever did happen, so there was no excuse other than obstructionism to vote against this.
Senate Democrats voted against letting NoVA and Hampton Roads keep tax revenues generated by those regions’ major transportation hubs to pay for transportation projects in those regions. Apparently they must not want to give up that revenue that they’d rather transfer to other parts of the state for other purposes. According to Del. Dave Englin (D-Alexandria):
In a Commonwealth, it’s perfectly appropriate for wealthier localities (i.e.: higher incomes and more economic activity) to subsidize poorer localities in the interest of the greater good (education, public safety, etc.)
No, I think that you are confusing “Commonwealth” with “communism,” Del. Englin…
To be fair, Englin then goes on to say the following:
However, for us to be able to keep delivering that level of economic activity to fund those needs in poorer areas, we need to repair our failing infrastructure, and that costs money.
That’s right and this was a completely reasonable approach to making sure that money is available with no chance for the state to skim off any of that revenue and without having to filter it through more levels of government as it shifts from these areas to Richmond and then back again.
Senate Democrats voted against locking up the transportation trust fund so it couldn’t be raided for other purposes. Of course they did. If they actually firewalled the trust fund, then they wouldn’t be able to spend the money on other things and then moan and wail about how there wasn’t enough money for transportation with the only answer being yet another tax increase. We’re on to your game there.
Finally, Senate Democrats voted against external review of VDOT and making congestion relief a priority. Once again, should we really be surprised? Heaven forbid that we actually try to squeeze efficiencies out of a government bureaucracy. And relieving congestion? Why that would damage the goal of the so-called “smart growthers” who want to get us out of our cars completely to begin with.
Just whose side are Virginia Democrats on? Based upon these votes, they certainly aren’t on the side of Virginia’s drivers, commuters and businesses.
Filed under: Bill Bolling, Democrats, Taxes, Transportation, Virginia General Assembly, Virginia Politics
[...] of the Day (well, so far) Riley at VV reviews the transportation funding ideas that the Democrats shot down because they didn’t [...]
Riley,
Thanks for the shout out, but I’m pretty sure I know the difference between communism and democracy. I presume you’re just kidding when you equate a social contract among free people designed to secure the blessings of liberty whether you’re born in wealthy Alexandria or no-so-wealthy Alleghany with a morally bankrupt economic and political theory in which individuals are slaves to the state. If you’re serious, then I hope you will urge legislators in low composite index localities to support changing the funding formulas so we all get back from the state the same amount of money for schools and roads that we put in.
I suppose if we choose we could organize our state such that localities get back what they put in and no money ever goes from wealthier localities to poorer localities. My constituents would fare very well, but I’m no sure about folks in other parts of Virginia.
Best,
David
You’re confusing an economic system (communism) with a political system (democracy) and miss the point that we live in a political system that is in fact a representative republic with a capitalist economic system. (For the record, most nations with a communist economic policy are totalitarian in nature politically.)
All that aside, and there is nothing wrong with helping areas that need help, there is a point where the transfer of wealth from one region to another becomes counterproductive. I think you’re almost there in grasping that based upon your liveblog comments, so I do hold out hope for you. (Just don’t let your constituents in Alexandria know that.)
Delegate Englin,
With all due respect you are arguing past Riley’s key points. The fact is, your party’s answer to every problem is to create an inefficient bureacracy where a simple and efficient distribution system would more than suffice(as hilighted by Bill Bolling).
It is actually mindblowing that you could, on the one hand complain that your constituency does not get what it pays in to the system (and as a resident of Arlington, I completely agree with that point), but then support the creation of a bureacracy that adds costs and inefficiencies to monies that could be seamlessly pumped into the areas where it is needed. Whose interest does that serve? Certainly not your constituents–unless of course they happen to be employed by the bureacracy.
Compounding this mistake is your party’s refusal to allow for an external review of VDOT. As we all seem to agree that transportation infrastructure is a mess in NoVa, and since VDOT has presided over this problem, why would anyone object to having a lean auditing team reviewing VDOT’s actions and making sure that revenues are being spent in a cost effective fashion?
Best,
Rittinger
Even wealthy Alexandria benefits from the port of Hampton Roads. Del. Englin should understand that future growth in port revenues is limited by growing traffic congestion around that same port. The Democrats position on the amended HB 6055 is to send that future port growth to Baltimore or South Carolina.
The Democrats have shown their hand. There is no compromise with them when it comes to tax increases. For them, taxes must be increased or else. It was sad to see them oppose and kill a bill simply because it didn’t meet their tax increase litmus test.
Riley – Having read the Communist Manifesto in the original Russian and majored in Russian Area Studies at the U.S. Air Force Academy, I promise that I’m not confusing anything. The reason communist nations are politically totalitarian is because one inherently flows from the other. Human beings posses inherent uniqueness and free will, which must be subjugated and eradicated for communism to succeed. (Which is why communist national experiments are doomed to failure from the start.) That is an intertwined political and economic reality. In any case, I’m not clear what, in your view, is so counterproductive about making sure the entire state’s infrastructure remains strong (statewide maintenance) and the unique infrastructure problems of two most congested regions (HR and NOVA) are addressed so that the economic engine (NOVA) can continue to function.
Brian – I’m not aware of a single Democrat who doesn’t fully support making the infrastructure investments necessary to support the port, and of course we all realize the statewide benefits of that economic activity. The core problem with HB 6055 (there were some other too) was that it did not address the statewide maintenance deficit, which means the revenue intended to improve infrastructure in Hampton Roads and Northern Virginia would not have actually materialized because the Virginia Constitution requires that maintenance be paid for before new construction.
Rittinger – The “efficiency” argument simply doesn’t hold water. I don’t have a problem with audits and of course we should always look for more efficient ways to manage our scarce resources. I have my beefs with VDOT, but the fact is that VDOT has been audited 8 times since 2001 and has been lauded by outside groups for the way it does business (including, most recently, my grad school alma mater, the Harvard Kennedy School of Government), and Virginia continues to be named Best Managed State, etc. in part because we have a relatively efficient and accountable government with relatively low taxes. No amount of auditing VDOT will produce the savings to address the $1 billion/year need.
Sorry Delegate Englin, but it defies credulity to think that forcing a revenue stream that could efficiently pass to existing local governments to instead be redirected to Richmond and then be filtered back to regional authorities is a sound way of efficiently handling money.
And while I will readily admit that I was not able to matriculate at a school on the Cambridge side of The Charles, the Good Fathers at Boston College, being Jesuits, were big on studying history and logic. The system your party is espousing is very similar to the one created by Robert Moses in New York State. As an admittedly amateur historian and a former resident of New York City, I can tell you that the system did not work and NYC has about as costly and badly managed infrastructure system as exists anywhere in the First World.
But aside from that, even if the obvious efficiency advantage of the Republican proposals aren’t enough to generate all the needed revenue, as a taxpayer, I’d like to see the efficient system utilized before you go digging any further into my pockets.
Rittinger – I assume by “forcing a revenue stream that could efficiently pass to existing local governments” you’re referring to the Port of Virginia and NOVA Airports revenue proposals listed in Bolling’s news release. In which case, exactly how much money for transportation would HR or NOVA get from “30% of future revenue growth at these facilities?” The bill’s patron couldn’t tell us. Nobody could. If your roof was leaking and you offered your contractor some percent of an unknown future number to fix it, do you think he would take the job? And what’s so efficient about delaying necessary projects while the costs of materials rise each day until some unknown amount of future revenue comes in? We could argue about the mechanism by which hard revenue is distributed, but that’s more a product of regionalism and not partisanship.
It’s precisely because Democrats care about being good stewards of taxpayer money that we’re not willing to make decisions based on imaginary, hoped for revenue. Once upon a time, Republicans believed in sober, responsible fiscal management. I’m not sure what happened.
[...] H/T Virginia Virtucon [...]
Except sir, the cost of construction materials is actually plummeting–a fact any of your constituents who have done work on their house in the last couple of years could have told you. And if you track the stock prices for the major infrastructure companies, they are doing well despite the bear market because their material costs have fallen as far as 50%. Moreover, you’re comparing apples to oranges with the contractor example. A more accurate analogy would be better to look at those future revenues in the same way an investor looks at future earnings with respect to the purchase of stock. Are you seriously attempting to argue that there is any doubt in your mind that one of the largest ports in the world is not an impressive revenue-generating engine? Are you seriously arguing that one of the busiest air terminal/air freight centers in the world is not an impressive revenue-generating engine? While I do not have a degree in publicy policy, I do have considerable experience with the financial services industry and I can tell you that if you attempted to make that argument to an analyst you’d be laughed out of the room.
There was a time when Democrats were not hostile to efficient government and didn’t want to suck every dollar they could out of the pockets of hard working people when there were viable alternatives available. Your party has fallen a long way since the days when JFK–aided in the Senate by men like Scoop Jackson–took an axe to the FDR’s oppressive tax scheme.
With that said, I thank you for your participation in this discussion. There are not many, if any public servants that I know who are willing to engage in debate with the other side in thses sorts of forums.
When I need to make a major purchase in my personal life, my first plan of action is never to get a second job to bring in more money. The first action is to look at my budget and savings, analyze where I may be wasting money (eating out too often etc.) and then make the necessary adjustments to make the purchase, if it’s truly a priority.
I applaud the Lt. Governor and others in this special session who tried to bring the same principles to the Transportation problem in our state. Times are getting tougher for VA families with increased gas and grocery costs. Before we ask those families to fork out more of their hard earned money, the State needs to show that it has made it’s own efforts to solve the funding issue. How could anyone have disagreed with those commonsense proposals?
Thanks, Bill!