Posted on Wednesday, 31st March 2010 by Jesse Walker

Well, things change.

Seven weeks later, the bill they introduced (HB 1218) is technically dead. The ideas in it are still alive and apparently will be transferred, Frankenstein-like, to dormant bills (HB 277 and HR 206) that stalled last year and can act as a vehicle. But House leaders declined to risk a floor vote on transportation funding by the March 26 deadline for a bill to pass at least one chamber. And as the land lays now, the one thing Perdue says must not be in the bill — a local ability to opt out of a region and its tax — is the one thing some influential stakeholders still say must be in the bill.

Business leaders and transportation advocates are on edge.

“We are choking on congestion in metro Atlanta,” said Chick Krautler, director of the Atlanta Regional Commission, a planning agency overseen by local leaders, citizens and businesses from across the metro area. “The sooner we get started, the better off we are. Every year you wait just to get the approval to start the process … It just becomes unacceptable.”

Metro Atlanta Chamber President Sam Williams echoed Krautler. “I feel like I’ve been here before,” Williams said. “But I’m also the eternal optimist that people, both chambers and the executive branch, really understand how critical this is for jobs in the future.”

He also sounded a warning.

“I would not want to be running for statewide office if I waited one more year on this issue,” Williams said. “I think the business community has heard so many promises on what’s going to be fixed that I don’t think they’re going to believe promises on this issue. This is the year of reckoning on this issue.”

Krautler said he also had hope, and added that the key will be the pace of negotiations once Statehouse leaders delve back into negotiations.

The legislative session lasts 40 working days, and Tuesday was the 31st. Legislators are expected to take a break next week.

Probably the most contentious point in the bill concerns a local government’s ability to opt not to be in a region formed for a transportation tax.  As introduced, HB 1218 would divide the state into 12 regions and call a referendum on a transportation tax in each. If legislators approved it, citizens in each region would vote on a 1-cent sales tax to fund a specific list of transportation projects within the region. In metro Atlanta’s 10-county region, a 1-cent sales tax could raise about $750 million to $790 million a year. The referendum probably wouldn’t take place until 2012.

Rep. Jim Cole (R-Forsyth), Perdue’s floor leader who pushed the bill, said the ability for a county or a region to opt out of the tax referendum was still a no-go, to preserve the integrity of regionwide transportation corridor projects. “We’ve said just about every issue, we could work with them on, except one,” he said, as the Legislature approached midnight on Friday.

He added that Perdue’s team was “a little disappointed” with all the changes the House made to the bill in committee, but “transportation’s still alive, and the governor’s happy with that.”

Legislators could circumvent Perdue if they made the issue a constitutional amendment, but that would require a two-thirds vote of their own chambers.  For that they would need Democratic votes, and they have placed no Democrats on the negotiating teams.

The Association County Commissioners of Georgia is one of the organizations making the case for more local choice in the regions.  The problem isn’t Atlanta, which ACCG sees as a clearly cohesive area. In the rest of the state, local leaders know best how a region should look, said ACCG lobbyist Matt Hicks.

However, Hicks insisted, that can be worked out. He and others also still see a strong sense of commitment from those top Georgia leaders. “There’s room for compromise,” he said.

Similar Posts:

Share

Posted in Business Investing | Comments (0)

Leave a Reply