Rendell teams up with Cabinet member to push toll road plan
HARRISBURG – Gov. Ed Rendell stood shoulder-to-shoulder with President Bush’s U.S. Secretary of Transportation Wednesday to rev up support for leasing the Pennsylvania Turnpike as a way to help patch the state’s transportation woes. U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters said states should expect federal dollars to continue to dwindle for transportation projects as she threw her support behind the concept of leasing the Turnpike to a private entity.
She said the 531-mile roadway could generate “billions of dollars” for the state’s transportation needs.
“Pennsylvania’s Turnpike has enormous potential because it recognizes fresh capital will lead to stronger roads, delivered faster, maintained better, and bringing more and more economic development opportunities to Pennsylvania,” Peters said.
But Rendell and state legislative leaders who stood in support of the idea Wednesday could not clearly pinpoint when the enabling legislation that would bring about a lease would be approved by the General Assembly. Support for a Turnpike lease is rocky, as some lawmakers worry about the possibility of foreign ownership and crafting adequate safeguards for the long run to ensure drivers don’t get nailed with high tolls or poorly-maintained roadways.
Even as a June 30 budget deadline looms, lawmakers still seem to be struggling with the scope of toll changes, including whether other roads such as I-80, which crosses the state’s northern tier, would be newly tolled as part of a funding bailout for mass transit and crumbling roads and bridges.
Rendell said he’s thinking of a Labor Day timeline for legislation and some kind of short-term funding flex to carry the ailing mass transit agencies through the summer, though they would have to pay the money back.
“I think there’s some stop gap things we can do but I think we’re looking at Labor Day in my judgment,” Rendell said.
Meanwhile, House Republican Leader Sam Smith doused the idea by saying that mass transit agencies like SEPTA and Pittsburgh’s Port Authority and other “lemons” should also be considered for leasing and not just a “plum” Turnpike.
“You got the Turnpike, a plum, you got a place like SEPTA, which is not the most efficient and cost effective operation, and there’s lots in between,” Smith said. “We have to look into those before we just rush into the Turnpike.”
Peters, who noted that she and her husband have ridden motorcycles along Pennsylvania roads, said the “free market” would promote “accountability” and could deliver better innovation and cost-savings than government is able to do.
Peters also noted that the federal highway trust fund will be broke by 2009. She blamed the increased prevalence of alternative fuel vehicles on the decline in gas tax dollars, which feed the fund.
“Improved miles-per-gallon and efficiency make the gas tax an increasingly unreliable, unsustainable source of funding for needed transportation improvements in the long term,” Peters said. “Please don’t rely on the federal government to fix this because there’s not enough money to do that.”
Rendell, who has made alternative energy a cornerstone of his policy agenda, later backed her on that assertion. Rendell added that the federal gas tax would have to be increased by 13-cents by 2015 in order to make the transportation trust fund whole.
“The gas tax itself will not grow as fast as it has in the past and may regress because of all those changes,” Rendell said. “[Alternative fuels are] a contributing factor. That’s what we’re saying.”
Pressed with questions on a timeline, House Transportation Committee Republican Chairman Richard Geist tiptoed around an answer, saying he has been working on public-private partnership legislation for four years. Finally, he pointed to the majority party’s chairman of the Transportation Committee, Democrat Rep. Joseph Markosek.
“I would hope Rep. Markosek would move that bill,” said Geist.
Smith said one of reasons legislation has been slow to move is that Rendell has still not publicly released the letters from 48 companies and the Turnpike Commission who are interested in a deal. Smith said the letters would “help us digest what the proposals are all about.”
Rendell said he’s working on redacting the names from the applications and will be making the letters public.
Alison Hawkes can be reached at 717-705-6330 or ahawkes@calkins-media.com