Transportation Benefit District discussed as one method of generating revenues via license fees, tax increases
By RYAN LANCASTER
Staff Reporter
Like many local leaders, officials with the city of Airway Heights are examining ways to secure more money for street repair projects, including the possibility of a Transportation Benefit District.
TBDs can be used to fund selected transportation improvements and maintenance projects through a variety of voter-approved sources, including sales and use taxes, impact fees and annual vehicle license fees. State law allows city or county governments to create these special-purpose tax districts by ordinance after a public hearings process. After a TBD is established, license fees can be increased up to $20 without voter approval, or up to $100 per vehicle with voter say-so.
City manager Albert Tripp said Airway Heights council members discussed the TBD option during a May 3 workshop to examine funding mechanisms for street projects listed in the city's six-year capital improvements plan.
State and federal grants will help finance some projects, such as a roughly $990,000 restructuring of Lawson Street expected to begin in June. But Tripp said like many communities, Airway Heights is facing less state and federal financial aid and is therefore examining more localized, stable sources of revenue like TBDs.
“We've looked at, if council put (a TBD) into place, how might it work?” Tripp said. “We'd have same options under the law as the county.”
Spokane Mayor Mary Verner proposed a regional TBD in her February 2010 state of the city address and Spokane County commissioners have since proposed forming a countywide TBD with 75 percent jurisdiction support and 60 percent voter approval. A draft proposition allocates 70 percent of TBD revenues to individual jurisdictions and 30 percent to projects of regional significance spanning two or more jurisdictions.
Cities can form their own TBDs before the county in order to keep 100 percent of any revenues generated by license fees or other taxes, but Commissioner Todd Mielke prefers the regional approach. “If people in Airway Heights never leave the city, that's fine, but we're all interconnected. That's the whole point of a regional TBD,” he said.
Mielke said so far he's spoken with city councils at Liberty Lake, Waverly and the Spokane Valley, and has had sit down sessions with members of Spokane's City Council and Cheney Mayor Tom Trulove. While most elected officials are non-committal at this point, Mielke said he's emphasizing that the draft proposal can still be amended.
Airway Heights Mayor Patrick Rushing said until he gets a better sense of what the public thinks of the idea, however, he's not in favor of moving forward with a TBD. “There's just not enough information yet on what voters want,” he said.
That's why a group of local transportation advocates are planning a poll to gather public opinion on the issue, Mielke said, although it could be up to six weeks before the data is collected and analyzed.
Rushing said instead of imposing a TBD to fix city streets, he'd like to see Airway Heights continue to seek matching federal and state grants or simply wait for a better economic climate before moving ahead with major street improvements. “At this point there's no sense in spending a whole lot,” he said. “We should be operating on a skeleton budget until the economy rebounds, which it will.”
Until it does, Rushing said, the city should focus on providing essential public services and residents wishing to hold onto their tax dollars should remain patient. “Some of the roads are not in the kind of shape we wish they were but you're not going to blow a tire, we can all just slow down a little bit. Remember, they drove covered wagons on dirt roads back in the 1800s.”
Ryan Lancaster can be reached at ryan@cheneyfreepress.com.
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