CONTINUAL COVERAGE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has been following the looming federal highway trust fund crisis since last year, when Georgia Department of Transportation Commissioner Keith Golden began warning about its potential to delay state projects. View past coverage at our premium website, MyAJC.com.
More than $100 million in road and bridge work planned for this summer in Georgia is being deferred because a key source of federal transportation funding is almost depleted.
Forty-one projects worth $118 million — mostly pavement resurfacing and road maintenance work — will be shelved until the state can be sure of getting reimbursed by the federal government, said Russell McMurry, chief engineer for the Georgia Department of Transportation.
Two pedestrian pathways at Georgia Gwinnett College are among the projects put on hiatus.
Another is a $1.5 million plan to make streets around Northlake Mall in DeKalb County safer and more walkable by adding sidewalks and street lamps. Tom Ulbricht, who chairs the Northlake Community Alliance, wasn’t aware that the plan had been stalled when a reporter called Thursday.
“This project is ready to go,” Ulbricht said. “To have the rug pulled out from under us would be tragic for the community.”
The nation’s highway trust fund, which pays for just over half of Georgia’s road and transit projects, is expected to become insolvent by the end of August if Congress can’t negotiate a fix. The current federal transportation bill expires at the end of September. But the U.S. Department of Transportation predicts the fund will run dry in August.
The highway trust fund is made up of revenue from the 18.4-cent-per-gallon federal motor fuel tax, which has dwindled over the past two decades because cars have become more fuel efficient, enabling Americans to buy less gas.
Congress has kept the highway trust fund afloat since 2008 with a series of temporary funding patches as lawmakers struggle to find a politically palatable long-term solution.
“My personal opinion is that we have a seemingly inept Congress that can’t agree on things that are really important in human beings’ lives and to our communities,” said a frustrated Ulbricht. “They’re letting us down because of all the politics and infighting.”
GDOT initially predicted it would have to delay work on almost twice as many summer projects because of the funding flap. However, the State Transportation Board freed up $130 million in bond money in May and permitted the use of $81.5 million in state motor fuel funds to keep priority projects on track.
Congress appears to be nearing a short-term solution.
On Tuesday, the House approved a $10.8 billion bill that would prop up the fund until May 2015. The Senate is expected to vote on the proposal next week.
Georgia and many other states would like to see a six-year transportation funding bill, which would allow for better long-term planning.
“It’s hard to plan for the future when you’re not sure what next year holds,” said McMurry.
Several ideas for how to fund transportation have been floated in Congress. The most obvious one — raising the gas tax — is one that U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., believes is a bad model.
“You’ve got to have a new mechanism to fund the trust fund,” Isakson said. “The holdup is deciding what that mechanism is. My suggestion is to put all hands on deck and debate the issue rather than kicking the can down the road. Hopefully we can do that before the extension expires next May.”
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