TIME FOR DELIBERATION ON UNIFIED TRANSPORTATION PLAN

My last column concerned the governor's transportation plan and the reasons why the first Republican Senate majority since 1948 didn't pass it, as it contained the largest tax increase in state history. Herewith, in broad outline, are some guiding principles that will likely be part of any Republican alternative to be offered in the 2002 session.

Central to the plan is a revolutionary concept known as economy in government. Our plan doesn't rule out new taxes. But before we ask for more taxes, we must adopt accountability measures, create a firewall to protect against future diversion of funds, disclose the election date and identify the amount of funding and the specific uses of those funds.

We must show taxpayers that the Missouri Department of Transportation, the General Assembly and the Holden administration are willing to make sacrifices to fund transportation.

Before we ask for new taxes, we must guarantee that revenue won't be hijacked to fund other areas of government. Sadly, this state has a record of diverting hundreds of millions of dollars of your fuel-tax money to fund other areas of state government. Much of the proposed Holden taxes weren't for new transportation projects, but to replace already diverted funds.

This must stop.

We could never get a commitment from the governor's office as to an election date at which the people would vote on the plan. What was the crying necessity to rush into action this year if the people wouldn't vote until November 2002?

A variety of polls done by various stakeholders in the process showed that at a time of rising energy prices, a tax-laden package such as the one Holden backed would be massacred by the people at the polls. Such an outcome, with its certain worsening of the already sharp urban-rural divisions in our state, would harm, not advance, the cause of improving our state's transportation system. Prudential judgments concerning the timing of a request for the people to approve more funds are an indispensable part of leadership.

My answer is to appoint a special committee to meet over the interim. MoDOT officials have announced that they will release their short-term and long-term plans this summer. Those needs, combined with information compiled by other groups, will allow us to determine the true cost of our transportation needs and build the necessary coalition to gain the additional needed funding.

I kept my word to allow the governor's plan to come to the floor and be debated. And I even kept my word to allow Sen. Jim Mathewson of Sedalia to handle this major legislation, even though he had resigned from the Transportation Committee in something of a huff and had co-opted the transportation chairman's own bill. A veteran statehouse reporter correctly observed to me that in the days before our majority, Democratic leaders would never have allowed so major a piece of legislation to be handled by a member of the minority party in the Senate.

It is my hope that the name-calling can stop and that we can use our interim committee to gather testimony and move forward. Only in this manner can we do the difficult work of putting together the necessary support to take a package to the people, whose approval will be necessary. To this end I remain committed, and I will be asking for help from the governor, Speaker Jim Kreider and other legislative leaders.

~Peter Kinder is assistant to the chairman of Rust Communications and is president pro tem of the Missouri Senate.