A step in the wrong direction

Gov. Bob McDonnell’s transportation plan includes legislation to prevent road construction money from being spent in the larger state budget.

It’s a proposal that’s long overdue.

Taxpayers deserve to have their money spent honestly by the government. If we pay a state tax on gasoline to fund roads, then that’s where those dollars should be spent.

But the governor doesn’t appear to have the same concerns about taking general fund dollars that are used for schools, colleges, police and prisons and putting that money into transportation.

Another part of the governor’s plan would allow one-quarter of 1 percent of the state sales tax dollars collected in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads to be spent for road projects in those two regions. The Associated Press reports that could mean up to $100 million for Northern Virginia and $40 million for Hampton Roads.

That may not seem like a lot of money, but using it to pay back construction bonds could get a lot of projects started in the next few years.

“The time to build new roads and bridges is now,” the governor said in a news release. “Interest rates and construction costs are at an all time low ... .”

McDonnell is correct about low interest rates and construction costs making this the time to start new road construction projects. As we’ve seen here in Danville with the construction of the new Robertson Bridge, a down economy is the best time to get a deal on a big public infrastructure projects.

But what McDonnell is proposing is a first step toward a future that none of us wants, a future when the economic engines of Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads are disconnected from the rest of Virginia.

For years, our local legislators have warned us of the day when those two regions would use their political clout to get what they wanted from state government — to the detriment of communities like this one.

Now we have a governor who wants to steer some state sales tax dollars that were raised to be spent in the larger state budget and give it to Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads.
This is a philosophical shift in how state dollars are spent that can’t be allowed to take root.

If it does, we could well look back on 2011 as the year when the well-off areas of our state stopped working on behalf of all Virginia and were allowed to care for their own needs, first and foremost.

While there is a lot in the governor’s plan that deserves consideration, this sales tax proposal has put the traditional political relationship between all Virginians on the edge of a slippery slope. It’s time to pull back from that edge and find another way to get Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads moving again.