In deciding how to manage and pay for repairs to the state’s roads, Gov. John Baldacci made a wise decision this week.
Before he considers adding tolls to the state’s interstate highway system, Baldacci said he wants to explore reducing the administrative expenses needed to run two separate entities to maintain state roads – the Department of Transportation and the Turnpike Authority.
With the state facing a projected $2 billion in additional money needed to keep up with road repairs over the next 10 years, Sen. Dennis Damon, D-Hancock, chairman of the Transportation Committee, expressed disappointment this week at the governor’s unwillingness to look at new tolls as a potential source of new revenue.
As a large state with a small population, Maine is always going to be struggling to keep up with road repairs. However, if the state’s history on road maintenance has proven anything, it’s that once the state installs tolls, they are here to stay.
The Turnpike Authority has been around since 1941, when the Legislature created it to use tolls to build a highway from Kittery to Fort Kent. However, the Turnpike Authority made it to only Augusta, and the rest of the interstate highway system was built by the Department of Transportation with state and federal tax dollars.
Nearly 70 years after it was created, the Turnpike Authority is still around, and so are its tolls. Much as we might hate to admit it, they both serve a useful purpose. Along with maintaining and widening the interstates when necessary, the revenue from the tolls going to an independent authority allows the state to borrow against it without going to statewide referendums that requires the support of two-thirds of voters.
However, maintaining that ability without the administrative overhead required to run two agencies serving a similar purpose – upkeep of the state’s roads – would be ideal. The Department of Transportation has 2,170 full-time employees, 480 part-time employees and an annual budget of $586 million. The Turnpike Authority has 394 full-time employees, 38 part-time employees and a budget of $107 million.
If the state can save any money by merging these two entities, it should do so, long before it even considers adding tolls to sections of the state’s interstate highway system that were built and have been maintained with tax dollars. The state will continue collecting those taxes – with or without new tolls.
That would go much further toward helping the state afford the cost of maintaining its roads in the long term. Adding another toll would be the easy way out of a complicated problem.
Brendan Moran, editor
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