Senate approves Perdue’s transportation plan

The Georgia Senate on Thursday approved the biggest reorganization of state transportation spending in more than 40 years.

The plan (Senate Bill 200) would gut the powers of the state Department of Transportation’s board, which is elected by the Legislature.

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The proposal gives the power to pick and plan most state road projects to a new State Transportation Authority, with leaders hand-picked by the governor, lieutenant governor and the speaker of the House of Representatives. The new agency would take in the State Road and Tollway Authority, which operates Ga. 400, and the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority, which runs commuter buses.

DOT might do little more than road maintenance.

Sen. Tommie Williams (R-Lyons), president pro tem of the Senate, said the new organization would be more efficient and complete projects faster.

“It doesn’t matter what we do with funding if we don’t fix the systemic problems at the department,” said Williams, who introduced the measure.

And Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle released a statement calling the plan “true transportation reform.”

“At the end of the day, this bill gives taxpayers more value for their dollar and will finally move forward transportation projects throughout our state that have sat on DOT’s shelf for years,” Cagle said in the statement.

Senate Democrats opposed the change. They said it was rushed and concentrates too much power in the hands of a few.

“We’re going to make the largest change in government in this state when we have three hours’ worth of hearings,” said Sen. Doug Stoner (D-Smyrna).

Sen. Steve Thompson (D-Marietta), referring to the 1963 reform that took transportation power from the governor and gave it to the independent DOT board, said the new plan would return the state “to a system that became corrupt.”

The proposal still must pass the House to become law and the level of support there is in question. After the Senate vote, Williams said there was “a long way to go to get this bill through the House.”

Although House Speaker Glenn Richardson joined Gov. Sonny Perdue and Cagle in announcing support for the proposal last month, the votes needed to pass it would come from rank-and-file legislators, who now control the makeup of the DOT board. Each of the 13 DOT board members represents a congressional district and is elected legislators who represent portions of the district.