Legislative Action

By DIANE ROSS

'Moving ahead' on roads but how much to 'get ahead' ?

ILLINOIS finally has a four-year, "move-ahead" road program.

Gov. James R. Thompson says a four-year program is necessary now because capital ships need that much more lead time to avoid capsizing in the whirlpool of inflation and the state must match that much more in federal funds to keep them afloat. What move ahead really means is a billion-dollar a year transportation budget. Thompson said all along that anything short of a billion dollars meant Illinois would "fall behind" in roads.

Taxpayers watched as first the truckers and then the construction workers took the governor to task for failing to sell the General Assembly on the move ahead idea in June. No wonder tax payers see the road program as a billion-dollar bonanza for the trucking and construction industries. It means jobs for the construction workers building the roads, business for the truckers battering them, and more jobs for construction workers rebuilding them.

Presumably, Illinois will need another four-year, move-ahead road program in 1983. How much will it cost then to avoid falling behind?

Taxpayers say state transportation secretary John D. Kramer is right when he says Illinois moved ahead from 1925 to 1950 but fell behind from 1950 to 1975. For 25 years roads were good and for 25 years roads went from bad to worse. Will it take another 25 years to get good roads again?

That's the question taxpayers should be asking: How long will it take to "get ahead"? Legislators should be asking the same question.

The formula for funding road programs is cumbersome at best, involving tax money, bond money and the diversionary branches of the Road Fund itself. "Moving ahead" forced legislators to juggle everything and come up with an entirely new combination of taxes, bonds and diversions. What feats of legerdemain will it take to keep the road program moving ahead?

Funding Thompson's four-year, move-ahead road program always meant a compromise. Thompson's and Chicago Mayor Jane Byrne's first and second compromise plans centered on increasing tax money by hiking the 7 1/2 cents-per-gallon gas tax(generating about $ 145 million per year) and hiking license plate fees (generating about $92 million per year). The grand total was $237 million more in tax money per year, for a total of $948 million more by 1983.

The first go-around But neither Thompson nor Byrne could sell legislators a statewide tax increase when some of the money would go to the Regional Transportation Authority (RTA), which serves the six-county metropolitan Chicago area. Byrne's Democrats were bedeviled by suburban Republicans who filibustered the plan to a deadline death at the end of the regular spring session. Suburban Republicans have long argued their constituents pay taxes, but get little service, from the RTA. Byrne's Democrats were able to deliver only $364 million of the $900 million transportation budget Thompson wanted; the $364 million was little more than half the $694 million transportation budget approved the year before, clearly a fall behind road program. When Thompson reconvened the General Assembly for the special session September 5, legislators learned that Thompson's and Byrne's third compromise plan scrapped the statewide gas tax hike in favor of an upstate sales tax surtax. Ostensibly, an upstate surtax would be more palatable than a statewide tax hike — at least to downstate legislators. Suburban Republicans, however, still refused to swallow the idea of new collar county taxes for what they see as a Cook County service. With no chance of a filibuster this time, suburban Republicans were left blustering and trying to change the minds of downstate Democrats. "For the last 20 years, you were promised

24/ October 1979/ Illinois Issues

roads and you never got 'em," said Rep. Elmer W. Conti(R., Elmwood). "I don't blame the downstaters," said Rep. Jack D. Davis (R., Beecher). "They've been conned, railroaded, blackmailed, cajoled and wheedled to the point where they're not going to get any roads unless they vote for this." Suburban Republicans conceded Thompson's and Byrne's third compromise plan made downstate legislators an offer they couldn't refuse. But some, including Sen. Mark Q. Rhoads (R., Western Springs) warned it was just that — an offer, not a sure thing. Rhoads compared the situation to the Peanuts comic strip: every fall Lucy holds out a football, Charlie Brown goes for it, and Lucy pulls it out from under him.

And suburban Republicans made a diehard attempt to damn the upstate sales surtax as the latest Democrat deal. "You never intended to remove the sales tax on food and medicine. That was purely a charade," said Rep. Edward E. Bluthardt (R., Schiller Park). Republicans said Democrats agreed not to override Thompson's veto of their food and drug measure (H.B. 2564) when he agreed to the upstate sales surtax.

But Democrats, seeing the advantage in a pressure vote on roads, denied any deal had been made. They tried unsuccessfully to amend the road program bill to effectively override Thompson's veto, thinking Thompson would have to take food and drugs if he wanted roads. If successful, Thompson couldn't have vetoed food and drugs again without giving Democrats the same chance to override roads. That delay would have cost millions in federal transportation funds. So, Democrats still have the fight to override Thompson's veto when the food and drug measure comes up at the regular October veto session.

The approved plan

As finally approved, Thompson's and Byrne's third compromise plan tossed out the annual state subsidy and the two-year-old, five-cents-per-gallon surtax the RTA levied on gas, which generated $65 million in 1979. It was replaced by the new surtax the RTA can levy on sales: up from five to six cents per dollar in Cook County and from five cents to five and one quarter cents per dollar in the collar counties (DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry and Will). The upstate sales surtax is expected to generate $200 million a year. The approved plan also includes a small, seemingly innocuous statewide tax: $30 per private, nondealer, vehicle sale, which is expected to generate $30 million a year. Grand total for Thompson's and Byrne's third compromise plan: $230 million a year for a total of $920 million by 1983. The $920 million is $28 million more than would have been generated under either of the earlier plans.

As finally approved, the plan also increases bond money. A new $400 million authorization for highway bonds will increase the state's credit line from $962 million to $ 1.362 billion, with the proceeds to be split evenly upstate and down. A new $200 million authorization for mass transit bonds will bump up borrowing power from $275 million to $475 million, with $180 million to go to the RTA and $20 million to go downstate, largely to East St. Louis.

Final votes

The final vote on the sales surtax bill (S.B. 889) was 110-65 in the House and 37-19 in the Senate. The vote on the bond increase bill (S.B. 890) was 115-59 in the House and 39-17 in the Senate. (The actual appropriation completing the billion dollar transportation budget came as an amendment to another measure, S.B. 669.)

And, as finally approved, the plan ends diversion of about $126 million out of the Road Fund, money which had been siphoned off for state police and traffic courts among other things, by 1983. But it begins diversion of about $121 million in state sales tax revenue into the Road Fund by 1983. The so-called 5.5 percent sales tax transfer represents the amount of sales tax receipts that come from gas sales.

Increasing the upstate tax burden to bolster the sagging RTA, especially using the sales surtax which affects drivers as well as riders, was enough to enrage suburban Republicans. But Thompson's and Byrne's compromise plan to rewrite the RTA funding formula didn't stop there.

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RTA plan

First, the approved plan ends the annual state subsidy, which ran about $135 million in fiscal 1979, according to RTA figures. And it ends the RTA-levied gas surtax, five cents per gallon, which ran about $65 million in fiscal 1979.

Second, the approved plan replaces the subsidy and the gas surtax with the RTA-levied sales surtax, one cent in Cook County and a quarter cent in the collar counties, which is expected to run about $200 million per year, according to RTA figures.

Third, to give the stumbling RTA a headstart, the approved plan allows a 10 percent fare increase, an extra nickel on the average 50-cent Chicago Transit Authority fare, which is expected to run about $23 million a year.

Fourth, the approved plan tried to sweeten the double dose of the surtax-fare hike. Four new members will be added to the eight-member RTA board, long deadlocked at four Chicago and four suburban members. The new 12-member board will include six from Cook County, one from suburban Cook, and five from the collar counties, including one to represent only DuPage County.

Thompson says the compromise means another $3 billion in federal aid by 1983 when Illinois will have generated another $1 billion in new tax money and Chicago will no longer be asking for help with the Crosstown Expressway and the Franklin Street Subway.

Thompson said Illinois would lose $70 million in fiscal 1980 if the General Assembly didn't come up with a billion-dollar transportation budget by the time the federal fiscal year begins October 1. But suburban Republicans like Rep. Herbert Huskey R., Oak Lawn) didn't buy the emergency argument.

No one quarrelled, however, with the $46 million in state aid Thompson says will go to local roads under the approved plan. Some 60 percent of the 5.5 percent sales tax transfer, the new diversion into the Motor Fuel Tax Fund, has been earmarked for local roads. Thompson says that means about $18 million in fiscal 1980, plus $15 million badly needed for bridges.

It makes sense to rewrite the RTA formula now. At age six, the RTA is old enough to stand alone.

But will the new formula solve the RTA's money problems or merely postpone them? One one hand, the RTA will lose about $200 million from old sources, but gain about $223 million from new. On the other, it still owes the state about $35 million on an initial $42 million loan due January 1, 1980. Now the deadline is January 1, 1985.

The promise

Will the new formula keep the promise of better service? Upstate tax payers welcome the 40 percent drop in gas tax, but face a 20 percent (Cook County) and 5 percent (collar counties) increase in sales tax — and a 10 percent increase in RTA fares.

With the RTA roadblock removed the state road program should finally move ahead. Apparently that's what Thompson and Byrne are gambling on It's obvious that federal emphasis is shifting from interstate highways to regional mass transportation. Chicago which is the nation's second largest city can expect a relatively large piece of the new federal money pie. From that perspective, a surtaxed road but bankrolls the bet. But the feds are going to be asking the same question the state is: can the RTA become self sufficient.

16/ October 1979/ Illinois Issues