Proposals to change highway funding to "follow the cars"

There's been some discussion in Arkansas media recently about whether highway funding should "follow the cars." The issue has been raised by Reps. Donna Hutchinson and Mark Martin, a few chamber officers in northwest Arkansas, and most recently, John Brummett in his Tuesday column. In political terms, this would mean shifting much of the highway funding from southern (4th CD) and eastern (1st CD) Arkansas to more populous areas of the state. This raises an interesting issue for a guy whose House district would likely benefit from such a scenario (54,000 cars travel through Miller County on I-30 daily, which is comparable to I-540 traffic counts in Benton and Washington counties), but which would be detrimental to southern Arkansas as a whole.

While the distribution of funds is an issue, it's not the only issue. The biggest problem is that there simply aren't enough funds to maintain the roads we have, nor is there enough in the way of matching funds to construct all the new interstate highways needed in the state. Highway Commission spokesman Randy Ort was quoted yesterday as saying that highway needs in the populous, traffic-congested central and northwest parts of the state are not being met, but neither are the needs in agricultural eastern and southern Arkansas, where farmers are troubled by narrow bridges and roads with no shoulders. “It’s not because of the distribution in funds, it’s because we don’t have the money,” Ort said. "No one is getting what they need." Former Highway Commissioner Ron Harrod noted that “if you pull the money and let the money follow the traffic you abandon half the system,” Harrod said, stating that nearly 50% of state roads handle about 80% of the traffic.

If you take much of the highway money from the 1st and 4th congressional districts, it'll only serve to compound deteriorating roads until wholesale reconstruction is required. Besides high traffic counts on I-30 and I-40 and US Highways, rural roads in southern and eastern Arkansas are taking a beating from logging trucks and 18-wheelers who are taking product from the forests and farms to the mills and markets.

Political issues. Then there's the political angle. I heard one legislator complaining yesterday that if it weren't for legislators in the 1st and 4th congressional districts doing the heavy lifting, there wouldn't be much in the way of highway revenue to divide. For example, here's a map showing the House vote of the governor's 2008 severance tax plan, the proceeds of which go to add'l highway funding (green voted for the tax, red voted against):

Legislators for decades have complained that many in the northwest quadrant oppose any and all taxes, but when it's time to divvy up the loot by way of highway, educational, and infrastructure funding, they claim that they're entitled to more of it. There's nothing wrong with that -- it's part of the political process, and besides, that area is an economic engine for the state, and they should get more of it to provide essential services for populous areas. Most other lawmakers would agree and have supported taxes in the past that support projects in northwest Arkansas, including the tobacco tax (NW satellite medical school campus), the severance tax (goes to roads and highways, including what most consider one of the most important projects in the state, the Bella Vista Bypass), and proposals to increase funding for higher education, much of which goes to our flagship university in Fayetteville. Still, it is an issue that exists in the halls of the Capitol and shouldn't be ignored if a debate arises regarding highway money "following the cars."

This debate will continue on forever, much like the funding mechanism to distribute funds to public schools. So long as there are differences in demographics and economics between all corners of the state, these types of issues will be solved only by debate, negotiation and compromise.