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Monday, October 1, 2007
Let Perdue steer transit; others must stay in own lane
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The point of utter exasperation approaches. The state desperately needs a realistic transportation plan — a statewide transportation plan — a gridlock-relief plan that covers the entire state of Georgia. Not one region. Not one agency. One statewide plan.
There’s one official in Georgia who can make this happen. One. Gov. Sonny Perdue.
The regional players in the metro area can develop their agendas — and propose to expand their mission, as the Atlanta Regional Commission is doing as it considers morphing from a planning agency into one that also builds projects on its regional transportation plan.
Former Department of Transportation board chairman David Doss of Rome can develop a plan, as he did — a fine ambitious plan to relieve congestion and promote economic development. But it’s just scratchings on a legal pad until anointed by the governor and/or the Georgia General Assembly.
And, of course, the Georgia Department of Transportation can pursue its traditional design-and-build approach that amounts to a plan of sorts, but it really needs revitalization — and a larger congestion-relief agenda that will require more money and a variety of private-sector design-fund-and-build players.
Tommie Williams of Lyons, Republican majority leader of the State Senate and a member of joint House-Senate transportation funding study committee, had a revealing exchange last week with Steve Stancil, executive director of the Georgia Regional Transportation Agency. That agency, incidentally, was created by former Gov. Roy Barnes and had he been elected to a second term, might have been a governor’s personal DOT. But Perdue won and GRTA monitors transportation issues and approves, or revises as need be, the ARC’s regional transportation project list.
Stancil was blunt in testifying before the study committee. “We’ve lost our focus when it comes to transportation in Georgia, and it’s time to get it back,” he said. “Funding is tight, and we can only do those projects with the most congestion relief. There is a time to plan and a time to build. It is our season to pull together and get building.” Since cheering aloud was disallowed, mine erupted internally. Yes! Truth. Urgency. Do.
“Who is actually deciding what we’re doing?” asked Williams.
“We’ve got too many people going in too many directions,” replied Stancil.
“How do we solve the problem?”
Real easy, said Stancil. Establish “who has the authority to do what and who has the best ideas.” Now, he said, “everybody who can afford a lobbyist” plays a role.
“I haven’t heard a solution yet on how to bring all these entities under control,” concluded Williams.
Stancil proceeded to list the players and their prescribed roles: GDOT is to implement and build, the ARC is to plan, GRTA has authority to build but should be monitoring and reporting on conditions and progress, in addition to approving the ARC transportation plan.
Then there’s the State Roads and Tollway Authority, which is collecting $20 million a year in Ga. 400 tolls and spending $8 million to improve the tolling infrastructure though the bonds are to be paid off in 2011. And there are other players, too, most on the public payroll.
The solutions, Stancil had told the committee earlier, should recognize that trips cross city and county lines. Therefore:
Projects should focus on reducing congestion and improving mobility, with regional projects favored that are monitored, managed and completed. GDOT, he said, should administer new funds “especially in metro Atlanta,” with projects and funding monitored by GRTA. “When those agencies need to be fixed or improved, let’s do that rather than create new legislative power.”
“We need to be picking on something we can do now — and realistically do,” Stancil said later.
House Speaker Glenn Richardson spoke, too. “I don’t have any answers or words of wisdom,” he said. “I am willing to do anything except to continue to do nothing.” Said Richardson and Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle in a joint release later: “There are far too many government agencies debating transportation plans instead of building roads.”
The first order of business: Put everybody back in their box. Define roles and authority. One leader can do that. The governor.
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Is crack worse than powder cocaine?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
As the U.S. Supreme Court returns for its fall term one case first up will revive the never-settled dispute about whether crack cocaine users and dealers should be punished more severely than those who use or deal the powder variety.
On Tuesday, the court will hear an appeal of a case involving a Gulf War veteran, Derrick Kimbrough, who was caught by Virginia police in 2004 in a known drug-dealing area. When police approached, he tried to run but was caught carrying bullets and $1,823 in cash. He pleaded guilty to possessing firearms, crack and powder cocaine.
Under sentencing guidelines that equate one gram of crack to 100 grams of the powdered stuff, Kimbrough, who is black, would have drawn a sentence of 19-to-22 years. The judge, U.S.District Court Judge Raymond A. Jackson, called the guidelines “ridiculous.” The case, he said, “is another example of how the crack cocaine guidelines are driving [sentences] to a point higher than necessary to do justice.”
He imposed a 15-year sentence. The government appealed the ruling. Arguments are Tuesday. The case literally is whether judges can draw their own conclusions on the crack-powder matter and set lower sentences. The Supreme Court is not being asked to strike down the 100-to-1 rule for crack and powder.
Congress set the crack-powder differential 21 years ago as part of the Reagan Administration’s war on drugs. The justification at the time was that crack was more commonly associated with gangs and violence. That rationale is dated and Congress, not the courts, should revisit the sentencing rules.
In the past five years, reports Michael Doyle of McClatchy Newspapers, 25,000 dealers and users have been sentenced in federal courts on crack offenses. Their sentences are, on average, about 50 percent longer — or 40 additional months —than those for power cocaine offenses. About 81 percent of those sentenced on crack and 27 percent of those sentenced on powder offenses are black.
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said in a speech last week at Howard University that he’ll pursue revision as President. “If you’re convicted of a crime involving drugs, of course you should be punished,” he said. “But let’s not make the punishment for crack cocaine that much more severe than the punishment for powder cocaine when the real difference is where the people are using them or who is using them.”
Congress, not the courts, is the place. U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clements properly argued that the judge in the Kimbrough case should be reversed. “If each sentencing judge is permitted to adopt whatever policy he deems appropriate with regard to individual drugs, defendants with identical real conduct will receive markedly different sentences.”
No perfect system exists. Either judges adhere to sentencing guidelines or some future advocacy group’s computerized statistical analysis will reveal that like conduct — whether murder, drug-dealing or any other crime — results in different sentences. Such is the real world of prosecutors, judges and juries.
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