Quality of roadways at heart of Measure D

Plans presented Thursday for spending Measure D monies - if Santa Barbara County voters renew that transportation tax next year - focus on highway and road improvements in the North County.

South Coast projects range from widening Highway 101 to commuter trains and bike lanes.

Of the estimated $1.05 billion that a renewed Measure D would generate over 30 years, $140 million would be allocated “off the top” for the largest project: Adding a third lane in each direction to an eight-mile stretch of 101 between Santa Barbara and Carpinteria.

Beyond that, separate “expenditure plans” are proposed in the North County and on the South Coast for the remaining $910 million, with $455 million earmarked for each region.

By a unanimous vote at a hearing in Santa Maria, 10 board members of the county Association of Governments (SBCAG) authorized its staff to seek public comments on the lists of proposed expenditures over the next three months.

The SBCAG board also gave the go-ahead to conduct polling aimed at gauging voters' willingness to renew Measure D, a half-percent sales tax that would require two-thirds voter approval to pass. It is due to be back on the ballot in November 2008.

The phone survey of hundreds of voters throughout the county, estimated to cost about $30,000, will be done in January, in time to make any changes to the ballot measure warranted by the poll results.

In the meantime, it's crucial to get public reaction to the spending plans compiled by regional committees in the North County and the South Coast, SBCAG Executive Director Jim Kemp told the board.

“We need to take these plans out to the public and gather some input, to determine whether they are supported by the community,” he explained.

SBCAG members decided earlier this year to put Measure D back on the ballot next November, two years after a different renewal measure fell well short of the 66.7-percent voter approval required for passage. That measure, which got only 54 percent approval countywide in November 2006, would have increased the tax to three-quarters of a cent per dollar of sales.

Measure D originally passed as a half-cent tax in 1980, but will expire in 2010 unless renewed by voters.

The November 2008 measure would be nearly identical to the existing one with respect to the North County, but includes less “flexible funding” for South Coast cities, which use that money mostly for road maintenance, officials said.

An estimated $25 million would be used instead for commuter/passenger rail projects on the South Coast, $13 million for improvements to the “regional bicycle and pedestrian network,” and $13 million to develop “safe routes to schools” for pedestrians and bicyclists.

Transit programs would also get a large share of the South Coast pot of money. About

$58 million would be directly allocated to the Santa Barbara Metropolitan Transit District (SBMTD) - for existing services and to expand bus service - rather than being separately doled out to that agency by the county and individual cities, as is currently done.

Another $27 million would be earmarked for a SBMTD “transit capital program,” to pay for new vehicles and facilities.

“Traffic demand reduction” programs on the South Coast would also get $7 million, and about $7.5 million would be allocated to improving a Goleta overpass.

About $48 million countywide would go to “inter-regional transit” projects that maintain and expand bus services between the North County and the South Coast.

In the North County, three-fourths of that region's money, about $341 million, would be “local flexible funding” allocated by population to individual cities and the county for whatever uses they deem appropriate. Most of that money is currently used for road maintenance and repairs, officials said.

In comparison, the South Coast “local flexible funding” would total about $273 million over the next three decades.

Several Highway 101 and Highway 246 improvement projects would get much of the remaining North County money. Some $20 million would be allocated to adding passing lanes on 246 and $8 million for upgrading the 246 crossing over Santa Ynez River.

Proposed expenditures in the Santa Maria-Orcutt area include several Highway 101 projects, including $10 million each for new freeway interchanges proposed at McCoy Lane, Union Valley Parkway and Highway 135 (Broadway). Another

$10 million would be earmarked as the local share of widening the Highway 101 bridge over the Santa Maria River.

There's also some North County money proposed for alternative transportation projects, including $3 million for bicycle-pedestrian “safe routes to school” and $2 million for “traffic demand reduction” through such things as carpools and vanpools.

Despite that, one speaker suggested Thursday that more money should be targeted for such projects. The proposed expenditure plans make “less of a commitment to alternatives than we think is appropriate,” said Kate Bechtel, spokeswoman for the Coalition for a Fair Measure D.

Andy Caldwell, speaking on behalf of the Coalition for Labor, Agriculture and Business, said that group concurs with the expenditure plans crafted by the regional groups, with a few exceptions.

“I believe our organization will be able to support this” Measure D renewal, he told the SBCAG board, “but we're not sure it's going to pass.”

Chuck Schultz can be reached at 925-2691, Ext. 2241, or cschultz@santamariatimes.com

November 16, 2007