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Greenbelt Alliance In the News

July 1, 2005

Area residents speak out on use of sales tax revenue

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About 20 residents offered their transportation improvement ideas at a community input meeting at the John F. Kennedy Public Library. They did so the same night signs of a long holiday weekend began impacting commutes with slow traffic.

Transportation leaders are trying to determine what to include in an improvement plan and when they may go to voters with a sales tax proposal.

Many said supporting beefed up mass transportation would help alleviate some traffic nightmares.

Brent Schoradt, the local representative with the Greenbelt Alliance, said he favored funding transit oriented development which include residential developments within transit hubs.

Solano Transportation Authority director Daryl Halls said, as has been transportation leaders' past priority, such a tax measure could fund adding car pool lanes on Interstate 80 from Vallejo to Vacaville.

Supporting new commuter train stations including one possibly in Benicia should be a central aspect of a sales tax, said Michael J. Hayes of Vallejo.

Benicia city officials scuttled plans to support a potential train station at a Lake Herman Road and Goodyear Road site but are pursuing an alternative location. The Lake Herman Road site was scrapped because a majority of the Benicia City Council feared it would induce sprawl and harm the environment.

Thursday, many said they feared what added traffic lanes might do.

"Without a growth management plan, I don't think this measure will pass," said Vallejo resident Theresa Karr.

Hayes said growth and land use concerns need to be a central aspect of a tax measure.

"I don't want my money going to the pockets of landowners," Hayes said. He said he didn't support the past two failed half cent sales tax measures because they didn't address growth concerns sufficiently.

Supervisor Barbara Kondylis, District 1-Vallejo, said no one is saying they want to stop population growth. But she said those concerned with sprawl favor denser, city-centered development, which avoids county farm land.

Kondylis and Schoradt are two of several county residents and elected leaders supporting a so-called Fair and Safe Traffic Solutions platform, which supports the inclusion of smart growth ideas in a transportation sales tax plan.

Vallejo resident Charles Legalos had a different approach that county transportation leaders said they hadn't factored in past tax plans.

Legalos said the county would be better off adding a toll lane to pay for the transportation priorities. He also said he thought car pool lane use is overstated.

In the next couple months, voters will have a better idea whether a transportation sales tax will appear on this November's ballot. An subgroup of the STA is set to decide what to do by the middle of this month.

Ballot measures in 2002 and 2004 fell just short of the two-thirds majority needed for approval.

- E-mail Greg Moberly at GMoberly@thnewsnet.com or call 553-6833.

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