Related Links

Agenda Item # 7

BOARD MEMORANDUM

RECOMMENDATION:

Approve the 2005 State Legislative Program for the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA).

BACKGROUND:

The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) annually adopts a State Legislative Program to provide direction for its legislative and policy activities in Sacramento for the year.

The purpose of the State Legislative Program is to establish statutory, regulatory and administrative policies and principles to guide VTA’s advocacy efforts at the state level.   The program is meant to be flexible in order to give VTA the ability to pursue unanticipated legislative and administrative opportunities that may present themselves during the course of the year, and to respond expeditiously to the dynamic political and programmatic processes in Sacramento.

The 2005 State Legislative Program is divided into the following 14 sections:

1. Transportation Funding.
2. Local Transportation Sales Taxes.
3. California Performance Review Report.
4. Project Delivery.
5. California Public Utilities Commission.
6. High-Occupancy Toll Lanes.
7. Toll Bridge Seismic Retrofit Program.
8. State Transportation Improvement Program.
9. Multi-Modalism.
10. Transit-Oriented Development.
11. Transportation and Social Equity.
12. Transportation and the Environment.
13. High-Speed Rail.
14. Transit Operating and Safety Issues.

DISCUSSION:

The highlights of VTA’s 2005 State Legislative Program are summarized as follows:

• During the deliberations on the FY 2006 state budget, protect the transfer of revenues generated by the sales tax on gasoline from the General Fund to the Transportation Investment Fund (TIF), oppose any suspension of Proposition 42, and oppose loaning transportation dollars to the General Fund.
  
• Oppose attempts to divert Transportation Development Act (TDA), Public Transportation Account or other transportation funding to non-transportation purposes.
  
• Ensure that any previous loans from the various state transportation accounts to help with prior-year General Fund deficits are not forgiven or deferred, but rather are repaid in full and with interest, as required under existing law.
  
• Ensure that sufficient funds are available for Santa Clara County Traffic Congestion Relief Program (TCRP) projects when these funds need to be drawn down.
  
• Explore ways to create budgetary “firewalls” for the various state transportation accounts, similar to what exists for the federal Highway Trust Fund, in order to ensure that transportation dollars actually get spent for transportation purposes.
  
• Eliminate the suspension provisions in Proposition 42 and replace them with the same constitutional protections that currently exist for other state transportation accounts, whereby loans are allowed to the General Fund, but must be repaid in full within three years, with interest.
  
• Support additional constitutional protections for all state transportation accounts that would do the following:   (a) provide that no more than two loans may be permitted in any 10-year period; and   (b) additional revenues could not be borrowed until previous loan balances have been repaid.
  
• Allow state transportation accounts to be continuously appropriated, rather than being subject to the adoption of the annual budget to prevent situations in which cash flow problems are created for transportation projects if the budget is not enacted by the beginning of the new fiscal year.
  
• Support legislation that would require the state gas and diesel fuel tax rates to be adjusted annually for inflation based upon changes in the California Consumer Price Index.
  
• Support legislation being sponsored by the California Transit Association to allow counties to double their TDA quarter-cent sales tax.
  
• Support efforts to broaden the sales tax base to include, at a minimum, some professional services to help compensate for the continuing erosion of this financial resource.
  
• Consider sponsoring legislation to provide VTA with the statutory authority to impose and collect a vehicle registration surcharge to fund traffic congestion management programs and other identified local transportation needs.

Local Transportation Sales Taxes

• Support efforts to address the negative impacts of the California Supreme Court’s Guardino decision and to lower the two-thirds voting requirement for local transportation sales tax measures.
  
• Oppose efforts to increase the percentage of local transportation sales tax revenues that would be allocated to the Board of Equalization for administering the collection of such tax revenues on behalf of self-help counties.

California Performance Review Report

• Oppose subsuming transportation within a larger Infrastructure Department and oppose eliminating the California Transportation Commission (CTC).
  
• Support organizational restructuring proposals related to transportation that would result in greater stability and consistency in policy direction to allow for more effective transportation planning and programming, as well as for more timely delivery of transportation capital improvement projects.
  
• Support providing a higher degree of autonomy and flexibility for the CTC and Caltrans.

Project Delivery

• Support recommendations contained in the California Performance Review (CPR) Report that call for providing greater flexibility in terms of the types of contracting methods that are allowed under state law.   Specifically, support:   (a) preserving and, if possible, expanding the ability of project sponsors to utilize the design-build method of contracting for transportation capital improvement projects; and  (b) preserving and, if possible, expanding the ability of project sponsors to contract out for project development work for transportation capital improvement projects.
  
• Support providing more flexibility in terms of allowing local transportation organizations to be designated as the lead agency for the preparation of environmental impact reports for state highway projects.

California Public Utilities Commission

• Work with the California Transit Association and other rail transit operators in the state to support legislation that would transfer public rail transit safety responsibilities from the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) to Caltrans.   The CPR Report includes a recommendation that is somewhat similar.

High-Occupancy Toll Lanes

• Support the recommendations contained in the CPR Report that call for providing general authorization in state law for local transportation organizations to develop high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes.

Toll Bridge Seismic Retrofit Program

• Advocate that funding for cost overruns related to the Bay Area Toll Bridge Seismic Retrofit Program should not come at the expense of State Transportation Improvement Program (STIP) or other transportation dollars that historically have been allocated to the region’s congestion management agencies, or at the expense of prior toll-funded commitments to projects in the bridge corridors through the Regional Measures 1 and 2 Programs.

State Transportation Improvement Program

• Oppose legislative proposals and policies that would take away any amount of STIP programming responsibility from the regions, or that are inconsistent with the principles and intent of SB 45 (Kopp).

Multi-Modalism

• Support legislative proposals and policies that ensure the development of a multi-modal transportation system that offers transportation consumers choices.

Transit-Oriented Development

• Support legislative proposals and policies that encourage transit-oriented development and other smart growth initiatives that enhance the effectiveness of public transit and other alternative modes of transportation.

Transportation and Social Equity

• Support legislative proposals and policies that make investments to serve transit-dependent communities, and provide enhanced opportunities for these communities to access goods, services and jobs.

Transportation and the Environment

• Support legislative proposals and policies that seek to preserve the environment through better transportation planning.
  
• Monitor the California Air Resources Board’s Urban Transit Bus Fleet Rule and its proposed Rule for Transit Agency Fleet Vehicles to ensure that these rules are consistent with VTA’s clean-fuels bus strategy, and do not impose any unnecessary financial and administrative burdens on public transit operators.
  
• Continue to participate in the California Fuel-Cell Partnership.   Through the partnership, pursue any opportunities for obtaining funding for the Zero-Emission Bus Demonstration Program that VTA is implementing with the San Mateo County Transit District (SamTrans).

High-Speed Rail

• Continue to advocate for a southern alignment into the Bay Area for the state’s proposed high-speed rail system, with a preference for an environmentally sensitive route through the Pacheco Pass that does not negatively impact Henry Coe State Park.

Transit Operating and Safety Issues

• Support legislation being sponsored by the California Transit Association to increase the penalties for those individuals who loiter around public transit facilities.
  
• Support legislation being sponsored by the California Transit Association to increase the penalties for assault and battery committed against an operator while a public transit vehicle is in motion.
  
• Support the efforts of the California Transit Association to reverse or mitigate the impacts of the California Supreme Court’s decision in the Bonanno case, which departed from a longstanding law stating that a public entity should not be held liable for a dangerous condition existing on property that it neither owns nor controls and is, therefore, powerless to remedy.

During the Administration and Finance Committee’s meeting held on December 16, 2004, committee members engaged in a thorough discussion of the following three elements of the recommended 2005 State Legislative Program:

• Support legislation being sponsored by the California Transit Association to allow counties to double their TDA quarter-cent sales tax.   The Board of Directors supported a similar bill last year, which passed the Assembly, but died in the Senate Revenue and Taxation Committee.
  
• Support efforts to broaden the sales tax base to include, at a minimum, some professional services to help compensate for the continuing erosion of this financial resource.   This item is included in the recommended 2005 State Legislative Program because it is one of the recommendations of the Ad Hoc Financial Stability Committee.  All of the Ad Hoc Committee’s recommendations were adopted by the Board of Directors in June 2003.  This item also is included in VTA’s Financial Stability Strategy, which the Board adopted in March 2004.
  
• Support efforts to address the negative impacts of the California Supreme Court’s Guardino decision and to lower the two-thirds voting requirement for local transportation sales tax measures.  This item historically has been a part of VTA’s State Legislative Program.  It also is one of the Ad Hoc Financial Stability Committee’s recommendations.

Some members of the Administration and Finance Committee questioned whether these three items should be included in the 2005 State Legislative Program.   They contended that the likelihood of their enactment is slim and, therefore, VTA should focus its efforts elsewhere.   They also pointed out that these items would result in a tax increase.  Other committee members countered that these items should remain in the program, pointing out that VTA, at this time, should not rule out potential options for generating additional revenues for transportation needs, regardless of how much of a challenge their enactment might be.  They argued that it is prudent for VTA to have a position already in place in the event that any of these items is able to pick up some momentum in the legislative process.

In the case of each of these three items, VTA would be supporting legislation that would be introduced, sponsored and pushed by others, as opposed to actively initiating and being the lead on such measures.

The Administration and Finance Committee forwarded the recommended 2005 State Legislative Program to the full Board of Directors for further discussion.

ALTERNATIVES:

It is necessary for VTA to have a State Legislative Program in place to be prepared to address the policy and legislative issues that may arise in Sacramento during the coming year.  The Board of Directors may elect to add other elements to VTA’s 2005 State Legislative Program, or to modify or delete elements contained in the recommended program.

FISCAL IMPACT:

There is no fiscal impact directly related to this recommendation.

Click here to return to the Board Agenda Index