DALLAS — At more than $18 billion, outstanding toll road debt in Texas exceeds the state government's tax-supported debt, and some lawmakers are saying "enough."
Nine bills introduced in the 2015 Legislature seek to limit funding for toll roads or to return turnpikes to free highways after their debt is paid off.
The sponsors of the legislation are conservative Republicans from some of the state's most affluent districts.
"There is a strong feeling in our communities that they are already paying too much for travel upon our roadways due to tolling of the three major highway corridors in Collin County," according to a letter from seven lawmakers and five county officials addressed to Texas Department of Transportation Executive Director Joe Weber in 2014.
The letter sought to prevent conversion of high-occupancy vehicle lanes on two major freeways into "managed lanes" that would require tolling.
One of the freeways targeted for tolling was U.S. 75, or Central Expressway, the north-south corridor whose congestion inspired construction of the Dallas North Tollway in 1968. That tollway has grown to 32 miles, anchoring a system with four connecting turnpikes, including the $3.2 billion Sam Rayburn Tollway serving Collin County north of Dallas. Meanwhile, U.S. 75 was expanded, including the addition of HOV lanes for commuters to and from downtown Dallas.
The current HOV lane, built with clean air funds, is a constant irritant that causes frustration for many drivers who use U.S. 75, the government leaders wrote.
"While we cannot correct the past, we can immediately add almost twenty percent capacity to our most important commuter highway by opening another general purpose lane on the existing HOV lane," they wrote.
Collin County was the second wealthiest county in Texas, based on 2006 median household income, after Fort Bend County west of Houston. Major toll roads serve both counties.
Because toll roads can generally be built and financed more quickly than traditional highways, they tend to serve more affluent suburbs experiencing rapid growth.
However, resentment of the tolls has prompted Collin County's representatives to seek some promise that the roads will someday be toll-free.
Three Republican state representatives from the county, Scott Sanford, Jeff Leach, and Matt Shaheen, have teamed up on a series of bills that they say will "move Texas toward a toll road free future."
"Individuals and businesses find that these taxes/tolls have become overly burdensome on their budgets and regard them as a substantial tax increase," Sanford said in a prepared statement. "Furthermore, citizens have felt left out of the decision-making process when it comes to transportation policy and decision-making. Too many times, they hear about a distant 'Authority' or 'Council' over which they have no familiarity, run by names that never appear on their ballots."
Sanford's House Bill 856 would require that Metropolitan Planning Organizations live-stream, record, and publish all meetings. MPOs are the regional authorities that allocate state and federal transportation funding. Sanford says the MPOs are responsible for funding rail projects that he considers a waste of money.
Another Sanford bill, HB 1834 requires approval by a county's commissioners court for all toll projects. The bill also requires toll road debts to be paid off in 20 years, after which the tolls would be removed. Sanford also introduced HB 1835, which would prohibit conversion of current free lanes to toll lanes and direct 10% of sales taxes to construction of free highways, and HB 1837 to require all toll road decisions to be made by elected officials rather than appointees.
Shaheen introduced two bills that would require conversion of toll roads to freeways after the bonds are paid off and also require county commissioners' approval of toll projects.
Leach introduced HB 202, which would dedicate half of the motor vehicle sales tax to maintenance and construction of free, non-tolled roadways and HB 203, which would commit auto parts sales tax to maintenance of free roads.
The package of bills is being pitched under the heading of "Toll Free Texas."
"Toll Free Texas will take time, but will begin moving Texas back toward great roads paid for by tax dollars, not tolls," Sanford said in a prepared statement. "And, in the event a community desires and approves a tolled project, it must be paid off and become a free roadway within twenty years. This movement moves the decision making process closer to the voters by having toll road decisions made by elected officials instead of career bureaucrats."
The proposals could flow into transportation legislation that already has the backing of Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, presiding officer of the state Senate. Abbott recently called on the legislature to treat transportation funding as one of five "emergency items" requiring urgent action.
Sen. Robert Nichols, R-Jacksonville, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, has already won his committee's approval of two measures he introduced, Senate Bill 5 and Senate Joint Resolution 5, to dedicate up to $2.8 billion of vehicle sales tax revenue to highway projects. Currently, that revenue goes to the general fund.
The Nichols measures would require voter approval as constitutional amendments, most likely in 2016. As currently written, Nichols' bills would not allow the sales tax revenue to go toward toll projects.
Nichols' bills have the support of a well-organized lobbying group that calls itself "Move Texas Forward." Move Texas Forward includes chambers of commerce from across the state and leaders of some of the largest trade associations in the state.
Abbott indirectly acknowledged the phenomenon of "toll fatigue" in his state of the state address in January, when he pledged to increase highway funding by $4 billion per year without increasing taxes, tolls or fees.
While Texas Republicans championed tolls as a way of avoiding a fuel tax increase, the state's dominant party has shown signs of switching gears. At the 2014 state Republican convention, the party approved a platform statement opposing tolls.
Other Republican-controlled states, notably Utah, have seen movements toward tolerance of fuel tax increases to support construction of untolled highways.
The Texas Transportation Commission that governs the Texas Department of Transportation has become a major toll-road operator under the 14-year tenure of former Gov. Rick Perry. Perry was a big promoter of toll roads, though we wasn't able to attain his dream of building the Trans Texas Corridor, a super tollway from Mexico to Oklahoma complete with utility and rail lines.
Perry's influence remains at TxDOT in the form of Weber, a former classmate at Texas A&M who heads the agency. But even Weber has acknowledged that "toll fatigue" will blunt efforts to make drivers pay directly for the roads they travel.
"That's a great concern — tolling fatigue," Weber said. "There's no doubt in my mind it's out there. We're sensitive to it. We're going to listen very closely with local communities out there."
