$400M SC House roads plan hopes to pass down the stretch

When the S.C. House of Representatives reconvenes on Tuesday, the roads funding ball will be back in their court.

Representatives anticipate voting on a planned $415 million funding bill this week, an expense in line with a Senate proposal passed last month. But House leaders hope to hold that funding to one year, and revive plans for long-term money for road work in the 2017 session.

The House and Senate have traded the issue since the House proposed a long-term plan last year that included increasing the state’s gas tax to help pay for repairs to the state’s roadways. The Senate’s latest plan would not increase the gas tax and funds road maintenance by using surplus funds in the state’s budget.

The House version also uses surplus funds, but would only use the funds once, in this year’s budget.

Ahead of the House’s return from its Easter break, the roads committee that first proposed the House plan met Thursday for the first time since January 2015, to review the state of the S.C. Department of Transportation. Rep. Gary Simrill, R-Rock Hill, who chairs the roads committee, wanted to highlight some of the agency’s funding issues and offer the House plan as the best possible solution.

Of the one-time money provided by the House plan, $366 million would be spent on road repairs, and $50 million will be bonded through the State Infrastructure Bank for up to $500 million in new highway construction. Also, $49 million would cover emergency repairs to roads and bridges following the October floods.

Like its Senate counterpart, the House plan takes advantage of an unexpected surplus in this year’s budget, but without making the proposed road funding a recurring expense. Simrill said he worries the Senate bill would lock a temporary surplus into DOT’s budget whether the state raises the same surplus in the future or not.

“If there’s a downturn, education will be on the table, law enforcement will be on the table, but not roads,” Simrill said.

The Senate bill drops House plans for increasing the gas tax, and shifts $130 million in income tax reductions meant to off-set the increase back into roads, something Simrill said Gov. Nikki Haley, who pushed for the reduction, will support if the legislation doesn’t include a fuel tax increase.

Simrill said he hopes that passing legislation that provides extra funding now, and tackles other administrative “reform” issues at DOT and the infrastructure bank, will pave the way for a stable funding source to come through next year.

“Once the gas tax is off the table, that leaves governance as the main issue,” Simrill said.

Brad Hanley, manager of the Legislative Audit Council, told the roads committee the current DOT structure splits oversight authority between a transportation secretary in the governor’s cabinet and a DOT commission, most members of which are appointed by legislators.

“We would recommend the law designate either one as the authority,” Hanley said, with either the secretary working without a commission or having a commission appointed entirely by the governor’s office.

Simrill says the House can support a reform of the commission that gives appointment power to the governor, in line with the Senate bill. DOT would also be given more authority over infrastructure bank spending.

“Sen. (Tom) Davis even said in his filibuster last year that he would not be against the fuel tax if it passed with a reform of DOT,” Simrill said.

Much of Thursday’s hearing focused on the results of a Legislative Audit Council review of DOT practices. Hanley told the committee that while the agency prioritizes roads for various funding streams – state and locally maintained roads, infrastructure bank funding versus county-directed C-Funds – the department of transportation doesn’t seem to have a single standard for evaluating all the state’s roadways.

“If each list has a priority 1, a priority 2, it’s hard for anybody to tell what the priority is,” Hanley said. “Which No. 5 is more important?”

Simrill said the audit shows how much reform is needed. Thirty-one percent of South Carolina’s roads were considered inferior in 2008, a number that rose to 51 percent in 2016.

“It shows the model they have now is not workable, and it bolsters what the ad hoc committee heard in 2014,” he said. “DOT does not have enough revenue.”

“If you take out the codification (of funding in the Senate bill), you can get back to a long-term solution.”

This story was originally published April 9, 2016 at 12:07 PM with the headline "$400M SC House roads plan hopes to pass down the stretch."