Dayton aides pitch transportation funding

The message was clear: Minnesota must find more money for fixing ­highways and expanding transit.

But the solution wasn't.

Dayton administration officials pleased transportation advocates at a forum this week by laying out a need for more funding. But officials wouldn't say whether they will press for a tax increase in the 2014 legislative session.

Commissioner Charlie Zelle of the state Department of Transportation said the administration is "really interested in a very long-term, comprehensive solution that would probably involve more than a 5-cent increase in the gas tax."

A package could include regular increases for motor vehicle sales taxes and registration fees, Zelle said, ­adding that the governor would like to "do something" in the legislative session beginning next year. But he cautioned Dayton is "very concerned that at this time this may not be politically possible. Facing an ­election … it's just hard politically."

With the state now expecting a big budget surplus, the governor could tap existing revenue to finance borrowing for modest highway and light-rail improvements instead of proposing a more permanent, larger source of new revenue.

But the indecision over raising transportation taxes also reflects mixed signals from the public and business community on the need for improvements and how to pay for them.

"You can't look at transportation funding in a vacuum without looking at the impact of all the other tax increases," said Deb McMillan, ­director of government affairs at TwinWest.

She cited $2.1 billion in tax increases that Dayton approved in the last legislative session and said her chamber might reconsider the transit tax if other taxes were relaxed.

Dayton made an effort to appease business this week when he came out in favor of using $231 million of the surplus to eliminate new sales taxes on farm equipment repairs, telecommunications supplies and commercial warehousing services that are scheduled to take effect April 1. Another $205 million should be used to cut taxes on the middle class, he said.

A poll this year by the St. Paul, Minneapolis and TwinWest chambers found that 57 percent of ­voters who live in seven metro counties would accept a half-cent increase in a Twin Cities sales tax earmarked for transit.

Yet concern about transportation problems may be waning.

When the state was facing a budget deficit two years ago, a Star Tribune poll found that 48 percent regarded transit costs as a prime target for cuts.

The surplus gives Dayton the opportunity to lay out an ambitious agenda for transportation in 2015 if he wins re-election, "framing it as unfinished business," said Lawrence Jacobs, a political science professor at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey School of Public Affairs.

Zelle and Metropolitan Council Chairwoman Susan Haigh are hosting public forums this week and next in the Twin Cities area that make a case for more transportation ­funding.

Minnesota ranks 38th in the nation in the quality of state highway pavement. It needs $30 billion in transportation funding for state bridges and highways over the next 20 years to be "economically competitive" but will fall $12 billion short, Zelle said.

Haigh illustrated how 11 other metro regions approved transit sales taxes greater than the quarter-cent transit tax now levied in the Twin ­Cities area. An attempt by Dayton last session to increase the Twin Cities transit tax by a half-cent failed.

"Now we have the right people in there to get this thing moving," ­Samuelson told Zelle and Haigh.

But Zelle said he's still taking the measure of public sentiment. He said Dayton told him to "get out there and listen to what people think" about transportation. As for funding proposals, "It's kind of early in the process. We're all very hopeful for [2014]. Whether it's '14 or '15 … we need a long-term comprehensive solution."