That’s Gene Dietz. Gene is the City’s Public Works Director. He has worked for the City of Eden Prairie for over 24 years. He is an engineer’s engineer. Gene is wearing a bullet-proof vest in this picture. For the kinds of emotional City issues (roads, noise, water fines, traffic, sewage, etc.) that Gene must confront from time to time, it’s probably not a bad idea for him to have his own bullet-proof vest. This one is only borrowed from his friends in the Police Department. Gene is my guest blogger today. Here are his thoughts on the pickle we’ve made for ourselves with our collective inability or unwillingness to take financial responsibility to improve our transportation system. Here’s Gene….
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Shutting Down The Tap
While wading through the �2030 Transportation Policy Plan� as prepared by the Metropolitan Council with aid of the Department of Transportation, the reality of nearly 1 million more people in the 7 county metro area and not enough money to provide for an adequate transportation system hit home! If we can�t support additional growth, then the answer is pretty clear�shut down all new development. No new homes, apartments, businesses, industry�nothing. If there isn�t enough money to support the infrastructure needs for today, much less for the future, we should do everything feasible to shut off the tap!
Take a breath and don�t hyperventilate.
In fact, growth is good for business, contributing to the Gross National Product is good and growth improves all our lives. BUT, moving ahead without a solid plan for preparing our transportation system for another million people is almost as silly as closing the door to growth. Here are a couple of thoughts.
Cities have had the ability for years to set aside certain revenues for the purpose of growth�it�s called Tax Increment Financing. The principal is fairly simple. Take the incremental property tax differential between the existing condition (vacant land or undervalued property) and the taxes generated by a new use and dedicate it to paying for something. Sometimes that something is reducing the development costs for the new business or enterprise, but sometimes it is used to pay for infrastructure improvements, such as roads and utilities. Why not develop a baseline of state revenue (say for January, 2005) and all the real revenue growth that occurs after that has a portion allocated for reinvestment into transportation infrastructure? Perhaps it is 5% or 35%–certainly there are economists that can help devise the amount. This approach is much more appealing than turning off the tap or having no plan to accommodate the projected impact to an already congested system.
Finally, what business sells their product for less than it costs to make it? What business has kept the same price for their product for 17 years�even if they lose money? If you haven�t guessed, the product is roads and the consumer pays for it at the gas pump in the form of a tax. Currently, we pay 20 cents per gallon in taxes�the same amount as in 1988. Oftentimes government is criticized for not running like a business. Sometimes it can�t. But the business principle of having a loss leader on your primary product line isn�t in any manual of government best practices�seems more like being stubborn on the part of our elected leadership. Each political party can expound on the reasons why we don�t have a plan, but the end result is: We don�t have a plan!
The two primary issues in our local lives are Transportation and Education (I�ll save this for another day) funding. It�s no secret that someone has to pay for it. It doesn�t take a rocket scientist to figure this out�just leaders with character.
