Now that the 2015 Georgia General Assembly is over, MARTA is taking stock of the new opportunities and challenges on the horizon.
Gov. Nathan Deal and members of the Legislature on both sides of the aisle should be applauded for their leadership and willingness to begin addressing transportation funding as a top priority for our region and state.
Granted, HB 170, the major transportation funding bill passed by the legislature, was focused on fixing neglected roads and bridges. The bill does include a provision that enables local governments to raise funds for transportation improvements – including transit capital projects – through passage of five-year, local option sales taxes.
But, despite hopeful predictions before the session began, HB 170 did not include a dedicated and ongoing source of funding for MARTA (or for any other transit agencies across Georgia). Although it’s clear that there’s still much left to do, we are encouraged by the emerging consensus that transit is a critical piece of the overall transportation puzzle and thus deserves substantial investment.
In the meantime, the legislature earmarked $75 million in one-time bond funding in the state budget to be split among Georgia’s 128 rural and urban public transportation providers, including MARTA. Although the financial need is far greater, the fact that such funds are being made available for public transportation statewide is astep in the right direction.
For MARTA, we’re grateful that most of the items on our 2015 legislative agenda were successful. In a welcome development, legislators permanently eliminated the obsolete requirement mandating that MARTA spend 50 percent of its sales tax revenues on capital expenses and the other 50 percent on operations. While not providing any new funding, removal of this provision gives the agency more flexibility in managing its resources.
There were several other legislative highlights for MARTA this year. They include:
- Correcting an unintended consequence of changes to Georgia's motor vehicle sales and ad valorem tax that, if left intact, was projected to cost MARTA up to $46 million over the next five years;
- Empowering MARTA to impose fines for violations of Ride With Respect, the customer code of conduct that has curtailed uncivil behavior on trains and buses;
- Requiring counties that wish to join the MARTA system to levy a full penny sales tax instead of a fractional amount; and
- Extending MARTA's one percent sales and use tax through the year 2057, therefore safeguarding the agency's bonding capacity for another 12 years.
Gov. Deal, Lt. Governor Casey Cagle, House Speaker David Ralston (R-Blue Ridge) and bipartisan majorities of the state House and Senate provided strong support for these priorities, and we deeply appreciate their leadership and assistance.
A measure that would have allowed Fulton, DeKalb and Clayton counties to conduct referenda to increase their MARTA sales tax contributions by a half penny was unfortunately defeated at the last minute. If voters had approved such an increase, the additional funds could have funded major capital expansion projects along the Clifton Corridor, Ga. 400 and I-20 East. Without new long-term capital funding, these expansion projects will remain in the planning stages, as they are today.
While there has been understandable disappointment that this year’s legislative session did not include sustainable long-term funding for transit, there is still cause for optimism. Although transit was once a taboo subject at the state capital, it has become part of a more robust and thoughtful dialogue about the transportation network Georgia will build in the years ahead. Over the next several months, we look forward to continuing the dialogue and discussions about long-term capital funding options that started in earnest during the 2015 General Assembly.
