OREGONIAN EDITORIAL - Wednesday, January 09, 2008 [1]
Seven years ago, then-City Commissioner Charlie Hales tried to add a novel road-repair fee to Portland utility bills. In the rear-view mirror, it's beginning to look like a smart maneuver. At the time, it felt like a swerve, both fast and slick.
Understand, it had then been eight years since the gas tax had increased. Hales' fee -- about $2 per month per household; $1,000 for some businesses -- was based on a theoretical trip-generation formula devised by the Institute of Transportation Engineers. While Hales convinced the Portland City Council his fee was fair, or fairish, or at least expedient, he failed to convince the community.
Grocers, restaurant owners and other high-traffic businesses balked at paying this ta --, er . . . fee, and staged a mutiny. We weren't too complimentary either; a couple of times, we called it "road kill."
Now a version of the utility fee has come roaring back to life. It would be larger for households -- $4.54 per month -- and average $83 per month for businesses (though most would pay less). Clearly, Commissioner Sam Adams learned from Hales' rocky experience when Adams was chief of staff for then-Mayor Vera Katz. Adams isn't just trotting the idea out to see whether he can make it stick. He has cemented a coalition in favor of it and brought the community along behind him.
At a public hearing today, there may be some testimony against the fee. But many businesses, citizens and interest groups now support it, recognizing that the health of the economy is directly dependent on safe, efficient streets.
Plus, the 89-member group convened by Adams to study the issues has recommended a number of safeguards to structure the fee more fairly, provide an avenue for appeals and ensure that the $24 million a year it generates will be spent repairing arterials, upgrading dangerous intersections, adding 20 miles of sidewalks and making other vital improvements.
Adams has held more than 20 town hall meetings, described in detail exactly where the money will go and tried to anticipate -- and answer -- any question voters might have about it. Given what Adams has run, which amounts to a campaign, it's fair to ask why the issue shouldn't go to voters for an OK.
Roughly 20 cities in Oregon have enacted such a fee. Yet it's still novel enough that, ideally, voters would have the chance to approve it. (It could still be referred to the ballot; threat of referral is what derailed the fee the first time around.) The trouble is that if voters flatten the idea, it's hard to imagine anyone picking it up again or any better idea coming along.
Meanwhile, it's been 15 years since the last legislative increase in the gas tax went into effect. Salem's making hopeful noises, but Portland shouldn't just wait and hope for state action.
What enhances confidence this time around is that Adams has engaged in a very public and thorough kicking-of-the-tires.
Based on that process, the council should go ahead and enact the fee. It no longer feels slick, but the fast is still there. And when it comes to our road system, fast is sounding better by the second.