Maryland transportation officials are on a statewide tour asking local government executives to identify their top traffic priorities with one cautionary note: The well to fund the projects has run dry.
State officials stopped in Towson and Baltimore City on Monday, where Baltimore County Executive Jim Smith and Mayor Sheila Dixon named projects such as an integrated transit system between Woodlawn and Johns Hopkins campus as their top needs. The stops were part of an annual tour for Maryland Transportation Secretary John Porcari and administrators ? this year coinciding with Gov. Martin O?Malley?s push to replenish the state?s transportation trust fund by indexing the gas tax with the rising cost of transportation construction costs.
O?Malley is also proposing to increase the vehicle titling tax from 5 percent to 6 percent, direct all rental car sales tax to the transportation fund and dedicate half of a corporate income tax increase to the fund. County officials Monday distributed Porcari?s talking points from his testimony before the General Assembly last week in support of the measures.
“We?re out here today outlining our priorities and hearing from the county their priorities,” Porcari said Monday. “The subtext of all this is, we simply can?t fund them.”
There is an estimated $40 billion backlog of transit projects across the state, and Porcari said this is the first year “in a long time” when no new projects were funded. O?Malley?s package ? estimated to net $400 million ? would be applied mostly to preserving the state?s aging system, he said.
In Towson, Smith identified the Dolfield Boulevard and Interstate 795 interchange in Owings Mills as the county?s top local transportation priority. He also named the U.S. 40 and Route 70 corridor, expected to be affected by the military base realignment, and a new MARC station in Middle River as others on his wish list.
Smith, who also testified in Annapolis last week in support of O?Malley?s package to address the state?s $1.5 billion structural deficit, said he would support an increase in the state?s gas tax to fund transit projects.
“I think we have to,” Smith said. “I think the public supports it, too.”
