Pawlenty: Funding for roads is still possible

06/08/2007

BY BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press
06/08/2007


After Gov. Tim Pawlenty and the 2007 Minnesota Legislature failed to agree on new ways to pay for transportation projects, the governor Wednesday said he is developing some "trial balloons" to float past legislative leaders for a financing package to be passed early next year.

"I have various ideas" for transportation funding, Pawlenty said at the Capitol, declining, however, to say which ones he favors.

He did say the menu of options includes a gas tax increase, borrowing money, using new technology to relieve congestion, paying for some transportation projects out of the state's general fund, and allowing private investors to build new highways.

Last month, the Republican governor vetoed a bill passed by the Democrat-controlled Legislature that would have increased the gas tax by a nickel a gallon; authorized the state to levy up to 2.5 cents more per gallon to pay for a 10-year, $1.5 billion highway bonding program; raised license tab fees; and allowed metropolitan-area counties to boost the sales tax rate by 0.5 percent for transit and road improvements.

Pawlenty had proposed accelerating more than 25 high-priority highway projects through a 10-year, $1.7 billion bonding program financed through existing taxes.

When he and lawmakers failed to reach an agreement, they passed a "lights-on" spending bill to keep critical Transportation Department operations going.

"Now we have to go back to the drawing board," Pawlenty said Wednesday.

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