High fuel costs won’t help roads

By Ed Trainor

Published: July 1, 2008

Franklin County Engineer David Palmer laments the fact that there is no “magic formula” that will help road departments with the funding crisis many are facing.
County and municipal departments with responsibility to maintain roads and bridges are struggling to make ends meet amidst rising fuel and material costs, not to mention the cost of labor and benefits.
In Alabama, taxes on motor fuels provide the bulk of revenue for cities and counties to maintain roads and bridges.
The state uses various formulas to divide the revenue among the 67 Alabama counties and their municipalities. Counties also receive an annual $500,000 federal appropriation.
While Franklin County depends primarily on revenue generated by fuel taxes and federal appropriations, some communities are using other means to generate revenue for road maintenance.
Lauderdale County Administrator Jenoice Bevis said a 2-cent gasoline tax generates about $475,000-$500,000 additional revenue annually for the county road department.
“Anything you can get helps,” said Lauderdale County Engineer Ken Allamel.
Allamel said 75 percent of the revenue generated by gasoline sales inside Florence city limits goes to the city. The county receives the remaining portion and the entire portion generated from gas sold outside the city limits.
There are 23 Alabama counties that have additional gas taxes that generate revenue for road and bridge maintenance.
Some counties and cities in other states find other ways to generate revenue for road work.
In 1996, Springfield, Mo., voters approved a one-eighth cent transportation sales tax that now raises about $5 million annually, said Marc Thornsberry, the city’s director of public works.
Springfield has a population of about 160,000, but also has a large population of college students at Missouri State University and a daily influx of commuters and shoppers.
“In the daytimes, we’re like a city of 350,000,” he said.
He said projects included in the next four-year cycle are stated on the ballot so voters know exactly how their money will be spent.
“Accountability is a huge issue with our voters,” Thornsberry said.
The sales tax has a four-year sunset clause and has been renewed in 2000, 2004 and comes up again this year.
The tax provides Springfield with about $20 million over the four-year period.
Thornsberry said that money is leveraged with money provided by the state and the county, and in some cases, local developers. Many of the projects that need improvement are along state highways.
He said the community benefits from the cooperation between the city and the state.
“We felt like we can do a better job by taking the highest priority, and if the highest priority is on the state system, that’s where we ought to be focusing,” Thornsberry said.
Calhoun, Cullman, Houston, Lamar and Shelby counties all use a portion of their sales taxes for road and bridge maintenance.
Mobile County Road Department in Alabama utilizes revenue generated by a 6.5-mill property tax, said county engineer Joe Ruffer.
Ruffer said the tax, which was created by a constitutional amendment, dates back to the 1930s.
Information provided to the Colbert County Road Department by County Revenue Commissioner Bill Thompson indicates that a 1-mill property tax could generate about $400,000 a year.
Like Springfield’s program, Mobile County’s pay-as-you-go program allows voters to approve a set of road projects that were recommended by the road department and approved by the Mobile County Commission.
“There could be as many as 15 projects,” Ruffer said.
About $40 million was raised during the two-year cycle of the program. A ballot entry lists the various projects that the tax revenue will fund, he said.
“We’ve never had one turned down,” Ruffer said. “It’s been overwhelmingly accepted because the public has to approve them. They’re generally well thought-out projects. There’s nothing on there that’s going to be controversial.”
Ruffer said he likes the pay-as-you-go concept because it takes the politics out of the selection of highway projects.
“The public gets to do that,” Ruffer said.
“It gives them a great deal of control. If they say ‘no,’ that’s the end of the story.”
While Franklin County doesn’t have the benefit of the programs used by Springfield and Mobile County, Palmer said one way the county can receive more revenue is to ensure that the county’s population is accurately calculated in the 2010 census.
Portions of the state gasoline taxes are returned to the counties based on their populations. If a county’s actual population is understated, it could lose money.
Palmer said the county could be losing millions of dollars because of an understated population.
Like many Alabama cities, Florence and Russellville use gasoline tax revenue that is earmarked for road and bridge maintenance.
Allamel points out that gas tax revenue does not increase when gas prices rise. What can happen, he said, is revenue decreases as people purchase less gas because of rising prices.