The mounting importance of transportation funding was expressed last week in two bills introduced by NJ Assembly Transportation Committee chair Alex DeCroce (R-Morris). The first (A-2378) would raise the cap on FY99 Trust Fund spending by almost $900 million and allow added debt to cover the extra spending.

The second bill (A-2379) proposes to establish a $500 million fund for bridge repair. The bridge repair bonds would not be part of the Trust Fund. Local aid for county and municipal bridges and state bridge repair would split the proceeds.

The bills are the work of an ad hoc committee of legislators including DeCroce and Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Andrew Ciesla (R-Ocean), the state treasurer, the NJ Alliance for Action and "a couple of others," according to DeCroce's office.

The bridge bonds would require approval of the voters in November 1999. The bill may signal an early "stopgap" measure focused on advancing popular, non-controversial "fix it first" projects without requiring legislators to pass a higher gas tax before their elections. Unfortunately, the bonds are backed by revenue from the sales tax (and if that is insufficient) a yet-to-be-levied additional local property tax. Motorists and truckers, not consumers and property owners, should pay for road and bridge repair. NJ property owners are already $733 million poorer per year from general revenue subsidies to roadways not returned as local aid.

The increase in annual Trust Fund spending could mean trouble for efforts to contain sprawl and traffic growth in New Jersey if NJDOT is permitted to continue to build new highways and add lanes to existing roads. Indeed, NJ DOT representatives announced this week they will try to increase the next Transportation Trust Fund's spending limit to $1 billion. The present Trust Fund has emptied out prematurely in part due to expensive new highway projects.

DeCroce's bridge bill follows the pre-Trust Fund model of selling bonds for particular projects. The bill dedicates the funds to a specific need (39 percent of the state's bridges are considered structurally deficient) and specific projects. But continual reliance on bridge and road repair (and transit) bond issues and voter volatility (they were sometimes defeated) led transportation interests to seek and win (in 1984) a "stable funding source" in the way of a dedicated gas tax poured into the Transportation Trust Fund.

That New Jersey is moving "back" to bridge bonds is a welcome sign in terms of accountable transportation spending, but a sad comment on DOT's inability to resist impulse capital decision-making. New Jersey's multi-year Trust Fund reauthorization should follow a similar path, with dedicated funds for transit, roadway maintenance, rail freight development, pedestrian safety and other areas.