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VTA pitches transportation tax to council
Officials say city infrastructure would benefit from plan
By Daniel Hindin
Carl Guardino, president of Silicon Valley Manufacturing Group and member of the Valley Transit Authority board, wants the Sunnyvale City Council to get on board the VTA plan for a new County Transportation Tax.
Guardinio stood before Sunnyvale's City Council on July 11, to pitch the countywide plan and tout the rewards the city would reap should the new tax be approved.
Guardino said that the new tax would provide money for basic street repairs, the electrification of Caltrain, synchronization of traffic signals and a new BART extension which would make stops in Milpitas, Santa Clara and San Jose.
Although no actions toward these goals can happen until the current transportation tax ends in 2006, Guardino aggressively urged the council to act now. He pointed to a booming economy and a major, contested, upcoming presidential election as reasons why this tax needs to be on the ballots this year.
Guardino informed the council that waiting until the next election could prove to be highly detrimental to the passing of the tax. "From working on campaigns for transportation taxes in 1984, 1992 and 1996, I know that the state of the economy is of utmost importance for passing taxes like these," he said.
The fact that the November election is a highly contested presidential election is also of major importance to Guardino because of the types of voters that the election will most likely attract. "These types of elections attract young people," he said. "Young people are the ones doing most of the commuting." Guardino's logic is that young commuters are the group most likely to vote for the new taxes.
Another key reason to act quickly that Guardino gave to the council was the last tax his group passed in 1996. It ran into a good deal of legal trouble that, he informed council, "pushed actions back by 21 months." Representatives from VTA were called to court because of some minor technicalities that had some major consequences.
The tax was passed as a combination of Measures A and B. Measure A was merely a list of transportation measures that the county wished to carry out. No increase in taxes was provided in the language of this measure. Measure B was listed as a general sales tax. Both measures were passed by the 50-percent-plus-one vote count that is necessary to pass measures of that sort.
The catch is county law specifies that any sales tax dedicated to transportation must pass by a two-thirds count. The VTA got around this law by listing the tax as a general sales tax under Measure B, completely separate from any language about transportation.
They did this, according to VTA vice chair and City Councilman Manuel Valerio, knowing that the "general" tax would go directly toward the transportation measures listed in Measure A. If these two measures had been listed together, two-thirds of the voters would have had to approve them. Two thirds of the voters did not approve both measures.
Although Measures A and B were upheld in court, Guardino figured that the same sort of legal action might follow the passage of this new tax. Therefore, he said, they can use all the extra time they can get to navigate through the legal process.
When Councilman Tim Risch asked which local projects will specifically affect Sunnyvale, Guardino replied with several possibilities.
Guardino said each town involved in the new tax would receive a set amount of money to repair potholes and other such street surface nuisances. However, he noted, since Sunnyvale does such a good job maintaining their roads, they would be allowed to use the allotted money in any way they saw fit. Besides this allotment, Guardino waved assurances of work on the Lawrence Expressway and a Mary Avenue overpass on Highways 101 and 237 under council members' noses.
On many occasions during the question and answer process, Guardino noted that he was very appreciative of the questions he was being asked. And whenever he wasn't sure of an answer to a particular question, he would refer the question to Valerio who, barring any unforeseen problems, plans to become chair of the VTA next year. Together, they tried to clear up any reservations that the council members may have had.
Andrew Chow of the Peninsula Rail 2000 Organization took his opportunity to give the council another alternative. Chow stressed to council that there were other options to solve overcrowding on local highways besides a BART extension.
A big part of Guardino's selling point was that a new BART extension could take as many as 88,000 vehicles off of the highways. However, Chow rebutted that a new BART line is not the only way to get these thousands of commuters off of the roads. His group, he stated, has a plan in which a rail other than BART could be built just as efficiently for a much cheaper price.
Valerio said he believes Chow and his group are in support of expanding Caltrain instead of BART. "There is room for more than one transit system in this area. One doesn't have to be diametrically opposed to the other. Caltrain will be concentrated in the West Bay and BART in the North and East Bay," Valerio said. He also said there is potential for links of the two systems.
Valerio said he supports the extension of BART because, "although BART is more expensive, it provides quicker turn-arounds and it's safer--there are less roadway crossings."
According to Valerio, the half-cent sales tax would raise $4 billion, and the state government has set aside $762 million for transportation. With the addition of some necessary local dollars, Valerio hopes that the $2 billion necessary to extend BART will be available.
Valerio says that although the BART extension will not run through Sunnyvale and many of the other towns involved, there is something in the plan for every part of the county. He stresses that BART is not the only issue. There will be additional funding to improve light rail and bus services, and Caltrain will be able to increase the number of trains that they run.
"So, although BART is the big ticket item and it won't come directly through Sunnyvale," Valerio said, "the plan will still have a positive effect on all roadways in Alameda and Santa Clara counties."
The ultimate decision of whether this tax will appear on the county ballots on November 7, is left to the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors. The board will vote on the item on Aug 8. Four of the five board members must approve it in order for it to be included on the ballots.
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
