Carona's local option transportation bill does not seem like a good option

I learned from reading the Transportation blog written by Michael Lindenberger of the Dallas Morning News that the Texas Senate has passed Dallas Sen. John Carona's transportation bill, one that would allow counties to raise taxes and fees to fund transportation projects.

"But despite the win," Lindenberger writes, "prospects for the bill look cloudy."

Whew! For a minute there, I thought we were in trouble.

Look, I realize this city, this region ... hell, the entire state ... needs new transportation alternatives and by that I don't any more of Gov. Perry's toll roads that are designed only to line the pockets of his influential Spanish cohorts. In fact, we don't need more roads at all -- we should, in fact, be trying to find ways to force gas-guzzling, impediment-spewing vehicles off the roads that we do have.

Second, the last thing we need to do is to give our unaccountable county commissioners the power to raise our taxes because we all know how those tyrants will react -- "Let's add another half-percent to the sales tax." Let's just for a second put aside the fact that the sales tax is the most unfair tax ever levied on a public; instead look at the numbers. Sales tax revenue is plummeting. I've heard the City of Dallas' latest sales tax figures are even below its recently lowered expectations. So an increase in the regressive sales tax might fund a rail line from Highland Park to University Park, but that's about it.

I also don't think it's a good time to slap additional fees on auto registrations either, which is another likely avenue the commissioners might travel. I would take a look at an additional gasoline tax, but that brings me back to what really needs to happen.

We already pay a state and a federal tax on each gallon of gasoline we purchase at the pump. Does anyone really know where that money is going? Is the state tax going into a special transportation fund or just into the general tax pool? My fear is that the second option is the correct one. Wherever that money's going, it needs to be kept out of the hands of the Texas Department of Transportation because TxDOT is not a transportation agency, it is a highway department; it will only use the money to fund more road building and will use all of its considerable influence to make sure none of it is used for rail infrastructure.

Does anybody know (Eddie Bernice Johnson--Are you listening) what percentage of the federal gasoline taxes paid by Texans finds its way back to funding transportation needs in this state? How much of it comes back to Texas for any purpose? If it is less than 100 per cent, is anyone being held accountable for why?

I would like for Sen. Carona to investigate whether more careful management of the taxes we already pay might be a superior option to giving our county commissioners the power to raise additional taxes.

Not only that, transportation issues like the ones we're facing need to be addressed on a regional and even a statewide level, not a county one. What happens when Dallas County Commissioners vote to levy an additional tax for transportation needs and the commissioners of Collin and Tarrant counties reject the idea? This state desperately needs a high-speed triangular rail line linking Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio, but that's never going to happen if every county through which such a line would be built needed to go to constituents asking them to approve a tax increase.

I think I know Corona's motives behind this legislation and I agree with them: We in this area simply can't afford to wait for the rest of the state to get off its duff when it comes to funding rail construction. We need to find a way to jumpstart the process. He's right. But I don't think giving each county the option to raise taxes is the correct way to go about it. Not in these times, at least.