These days, Virginia lawmakers are getting an earful from voters who are mad as heck about the new traffic fees that could run a guy $900 for going 20 mph over the speed limit. While these “abuser fees” — as the bill’s sponsor calls them — are not popular with the average Virginian, they could be the answer to the prayers of the most generous group of political donors in the commonwealth: developers.
Earlier this year, the Republican majority in both chambers of the General Assembly joined together with Democratic Gov. Tim Kaine to pass House Bill 3202, with the express purpose of raising “statewide funding of transportation projects,” according to the state legislature’s website. To the outrage of many Virginians, the law creates new “fees” for misdemeanor and felony traffic offenses including, for example, $900-plus fines for driving a commercial vehicle without a commercial vehicle endorsement on one’s license.
Reason magazine’s Radley Balko pointed out that the bill’s chief sponsor, Del. David Albo, R- Springfield, is a partner in a law firm specializing in traffic cases. The clear conflict of interest here is that Albo is legislating himself more clients. But the broader benefit of these draconian-seeming traffic laws will by far go to the developers.
For years, Virginia developers have been pouring millions of dollars into the coffers of Republican, Democratic, and Independent candidates as well as referendum committees trying to secure dedicated sources of road funding. Developers provided most of the money behind the 2002 ballot initiative in Northern Virginia to raise sales taxes in order to pay for more roads. The Virginia Public Access Project reports that $1.1 million of the $2 million raised by “Citizens for Better Transportation” came from the “Real Estate/Construction” industry.
What’s going on here — from the developers’ campaign to raise sales taxes in 2002 to former Gov. Mark Warner’s tax hikes in 2004 and the steep traffic fees today — is an attempt by the developers to externalize their costs. “The developers are asking you to pay for their driveway,” state Sen. Ken Cuccinelli, R-Centreville, aptly put it during the sales tax campaign. Any legislation that creates a dedicated source for road funding — as long as it doesn’t directly tax those road users or landowners — is a boon to the big developers of Northern Virginia.
Albo’s bill not only directs all these special traffic fees to road building, but it empowers the regional highway authorities to raise taxes for the sake of roads. These authorities have long been on the wish list of Northern Virginia developers, who likely expect to turn them into cash cows.
The business model appears to work this way: A developer buys land in a place that’s not well served by roads because it is either too congested or inaccessible, which means the land will be sold at a discount. He then spends hundreds of thousands of dollars lobbying for state highway money to make his land more valuable so that he can then sell new homes for higher prices. You eventually have more roads, but because more people are using them, it’s just as congested — and you’re stuck with higher taxes.
For some of these developers, such as the highway builders, new sources of dedicated highway funds have more direct benefits.
In his successful 2005 run for governor, Democrat Tim Kaine — an enthusiastic supporter of the “abuser fees” — received more money from developers ($3.3 million) than from any other industry. Some developers, such as highway builder Wiley Roark, who gave to Republican Jerry Kilgore in 2005 ($10,000 in Roark’s case), atoned after the election by giving generously to Kaine’s inaugural committee (Roark gave $8,100).
Del. Albo and his co-sponsor, Del. Thomas Rust, both dip deeply into developer pockets. This election cycle, Albo received more from developers than from any other industry, including gifts from well-connected developers “Til” Hazel, William Hazel, and Barbara Fried. Rust, a longtime champion of tax hikes for highway money, has hauled in more than $40,000 from the Hazel family in this election cycle alone, and upwards of $400,000 from developers over his career.
The new traffic fees might force some Virginia drivers to slow down, but their main purpose is to allow big developers to speed up.
Examiner columnist Timothy P. Carney is author of “The Big Rip-off: How big business and big government steal your money.”
