Cape council wants limit on use of TTF

Public transit projects shouldn't be funded with transportation sales tax money, say Cape Girardeau City Council members.

Adding funding for public transit could jeopardize chances of getting voters to extend the half-cent transportation sales tax for another five years, Mayor Jay Knudtson and council members said.

The council plans to ask voters in August to extend the tax to fund various street projects. The tax would generate an estimated $20.3 million over the next five years.

Officials with United Way of Southeast Missouri and the Community Caring Council recently asked the city council to earmark some money in the transportation trust fund plan as a local match to secure federal funding for a public transportation system in Cape Girardeau.

The written request didn't include a specific dollar amount.

United Way officials have repeatedly voiced the need for a public transit system. Larry Dunger of Scott City, who heads the United Way board of directors, said the goal is to establish a fixed-route bus system in Cape Girardeau.

In a Feb. 14 letter to the council, the executive directors of the United Way and the Community Caring Council wrote that federal funding could provide 80 percent of the money needed for vehicles.

Federal funding also is available to help pay operating costs, they said.

Nancy Jernigan, executive director of the United Way, and Tom Davisson, executive director of the Community Caring Council, predicted that a fixed-route system could be established before 2010.

"We feel it is important that the city make allowances at this time to have funding available to meet this important need," they wrote.

But council members said it's more important to extend the decade-old transportation sales tax to fund major road projects.

"We just need to make sure it passes," Knudtson said.

He and other council members also don't want to earmark transportation trust fund money to help finance airport improvements.

The city has earned the trust of voters by constructing road projects as promised, the mayor said. "Anything that dilutes that trust, I think, would be a critical mistake," he said.

If voters reject the tax extension, it will be difficult to ever get voter approval of that tax again, Knudtson said.

Still, council members said they continue to hear from constituents unhappy about inadequate public transportation. "That need is there," Councilman Charlie Herbst said.

But Knudtson said it's premature to talk about funding a public transit system pending completion of a Missouri Department of Transportation study of transit needs for the area.

The study is expected to be completed by September. It likely will recommend a fixed-route bus system be established, Davisson said.

Jeff Brune, who directs the Cape County Transit Authority, which operates a van service largely for the elderly, said his agency at some point might run a fixed-route system in Cape Girardeau under a contract with the city of Cape Girardeau. But no plans are in place now.

mbliss@semissourian.com

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