ABC-7 Xtra: State Rep Pickett talks funding El Paso roads

el el paso >> live, where news comes first, this is “abc-7 xtra. >> good evening, i’m maria garcia, welcome to “abc-7 xtra. tonight we’re talking about something that affects everyone out there, whether you live in the county or the city, in the northeast or the lower valley or the west side, we all use our public roads. and some of them have really exceed their life span. with a growing population and aging highways like i 10, transportation officials say we need billions more a year in funding. in just a few weeks you’ll be able to vote on the important issue. here in texas state representative joe pickett, the el el paso democrat, is asking voters to improve money for transportation projects. proposition 7, a constitutional amendment, would take parts of the state’s general sales tax, the motor vehicle sales tax and the rental tax and put them in the state highway fund. if approved lawmakers say prop 7 could provide an extra $2.5 billion a year for roads. representative pickett will be joing me tonight. pickett is the chairman of the texas house committee on transportation. he’s also here to answer your questions. email them to abc7xtra@kvia.com, call us at 915-496-1775, on twitter @mariagabc7 and use the #abc7xtra. >> just drove in. >> i know, i know, you were just telling me. >> on our patchy interstate 10. >> speaking interstate 10, that is the highway that el el paso residents use the most. in terms of are of its life span, how is i 10 doing? >> it’s about 10 years over its life span, and it’s us using it, not other people. a lot of residents think because it starts in california and ends in florida it’s all through traffic. but the county vehicles, it’s about 80,000 a day. it’s a little more than that out east. but if you count the cars in the middle of el el paso around basset center, it’s around $240,000 a day. >> that he people who live in the region. let’s talk about prop 7. the state has spent more than $25 billion on highway construction and road maintenance in the last 12 years or so. but it’s really relied on debt and one-time cash flows. so it doesn’t seem like the most sustainable system. >> it hasn’t been. for the last 10 years we’ve been borrowing money and it’s taken a lot of effort to get my colleagues to understand we can’t just keep borrowing money. we haven’t put any general revenue in for decades, either. problem 1 passed, it was related to the oil and gas severance tax, that means about $1.2 billion a year. but that’s just replacing the debt that we’re paying. prop 7 will be a minimum of three times that amount of money if we’re successful. >> currently texas has $31 billion in voter approved road?? debt from what i understand. so that doesn’t include toll road debt. the state is spending like $1 billion a year just to finance the debt alone. >> we’re spending $1.3 billion a year on credit card payments for the money that we borrowed and that doesn’t include the toll road debt. >> that’s just for voter-approved road construction. >> there were three bond initiatives over the last 10 or 12 years. there’s problem 12, we call it prop 14 mobility fund. part of the process this last session to get a consensus for this proposal was to cut off the rest of the debt. that was another bill, separate from prop 7, but part of the package that was presented to the whole body was stopping the debt, as well. we did that this session, as well. >> the longer you wait to construct new roads the more expensive it’ll be, i think. inflation has increased in texas, construction inflation, like 106% since 1991. >> yeah, the longer we wait the harder it is. we’ve gotten big ones underway but there’s still a lot of projects. interstate 10, we’ve got finish the border highway west extension. approximate prop 7 is successful we could help with those around the state. part of the selling point was we can’t use it for toll roads. each places like north texas and dallas where there’s a lot of toll roads, they are having toll fatigue and it’s been part of the package the last two sessions to try to pull back on toll roads, as well. prop 7 will help that. >> if this passes you would propose removing the toll road — >> yes. >> . there’s no debt on it or the new extension that’s being proposed, either. the reason there are tolls proposed, the state of texas said what do we do about maintenance in the future? most cities like ours were pressured into having some toll projects, even debt to pay off the toll road itself. it was built for money 20 years down the road. we should be able to reverse some of those around the state of texas including right here in el el paso. >> anecdotally we here into our newsroom comments from viewers, it doesn’t seem like the toll road’s being used, hardly at all. >> i did some numbers the other day. i asked the district engineer to run some numbers. if you look at it right now it’s somewhere between 3% and 6%, all the traffic. that’s it, 3 to 6%. >> ever using the toll road? >> that’s you the. >> there has to be a number within that, people who aren’t paying, using it but potentially could not be paying? >> i use it as much as possible. we have no way of billing you and going after you and trying to make a point that way. i’m not a fan at all. >> not a fan of the toll roads. >> yeah. >> i think a lot of residents would agree with you, judging by what we hear from comments from our viewers. texas is growing, the state population growing by i think 1200 people a day. >> that’s right. >> but it doesn’t seem like infrastructure is keeping up with the population growth. >> it hasn’t. we have some of the same roadways from 10 or 15 years ago. and prop 7 is based off of our success. when the rest of the country took that big dip in 2008, 2009, that didn’t happen in texas. we were able to maintain. prop 7 is based on our success in the future, based on sales tax, general sales tax, part one. and everybody participants in that. you dry a he-vehicle, you take mass transit or drive a car, everybody drives something where sales tax is charged on it. we would put it aside for transportation. >> speak of other forms of transportation that you just mentioned, u.s. cities have really relied on building out capacity, more roads, more highways, for decrease congestion. but if you look at the numbers in all u.s. cities congestion has also increased. >> right. >> so there’s an argument that building more highways is not an effective way to decrease congestion. >> we need to turn it over to the milliennials who are driving less, waiting to get their driver’s licenses. we really can’t, there’s still a lot to do between now and then. it’s a cultural change. metro has their rapid trendy. there are people who are stride laid rail. you’re developing new businesses in residential areas to meet the need. i visit austin a lot because i have to. it’s going crazy, they are barely 2.5 parking spaces with each one. they are not encouraging people to take mass transit. texas itself, we’re talking about high-speed rail from houston to dallas. none of this money would be used for high-speed rail or attendant for that matter. >> it wouldn’t be used for any other kind. trendy, just new destruction and highs and roads. right now tonight, april oh on my way home, people forget once we open a bridge and overpass highway and cut the ribbon and everybody’s celebrating, we still have 20, 30, 40 years that we have to pay for the maintenance. the lather amount of partnership is for guilty. going back to what we were talking about, the different modes of transportation. an argument says why increase texas-dot’s budget? is it perhaps using a more effective multimodal approach, and providing more options for commuters rather than just building out more capacity, more highways? >> we’re really playing catchup. even if we were to be very onerous on the driving public and say you can’t drive but so many miles a year, weld still be saying understanding up. the evacuation traffic on the roads, that wouldn’t go away. it doesn’t mean you don’t encourage other modes of transportation. we receive transit money separate from the highway money. but we’re still talking about playing catchup. here in el el paso, force police, verse 601, we need the direct connects on that, we need to to fix 6010. >> okay. >> we just don’t have the money when we need to do i. everyone was jumping for joy but you were beat up with direct connections, because we didn’t have the money. last year there are eight connections to make it complete, so that take as large chump of money and that helps congestion quite a bit. >> billions of it was in 91 roads. will this strap taxpayers in the future with tens of millions every year, costs for preservation and maintain of these new roads that will be constructed with this money? >> not per se, because the plan is to split the money between construction, the lions share probably about — in the future it’s going to maintenance, not just going to build new roads. we planned this to have a growth factor. there are two part of parts. one is on future sales of motorcycles themselves. once we pit five biennium a your an sales. this isn’t just 2.5 or $3 billion at one time, that’s the amount we expect after it passes. but it’ll grow somewhere between two and $3 hadn’t million. >> wow, that’s impressive. when we come back we’ll get to your tweets and emails and questions. we’re here with state representative joe pickett. email us your comment and questions >> welcome back to “abc-7 xtra. we’re talking about proposition 7 up for the votes in the november 3rd election. let go to a question from robert, he’s asking: my question to representative pickett, has texas are considered having a double deck i 10 here in el el paso? >> double decking montana, i 10, the costs are just really high because of getting something up that high. what we’re hoping works best, when we finish the border west extension, it becomes almost parallel to i 10. that should really alleviate a lot of congestion on interstate 10, having that parallel route. on the west side in downtown it’s real close. it getz further way as you go out east. i live mere lee trevino in the montana area. i will take the nontoll part to town and it’s not really a great deal out of my way. once it’s complete it’s probably help tremendouslily. >> and this is from manny: why is so much work being done on the aesthetics and decorating i 10 and tearing up the middle divider, yet i 10 at mccray for example going east, no extra lane to alleviate traffic? >> we’re actually required now to use a percentage of the project’s money for aesthetics. >> we put one out there all by itself, there’s a lot of opinions. i think the aesthetics help, it brings a little pride in our community. one of the first things i did when city council was starting landscaping medians and it actually made a difference in the neighborhoods. we’re not spending as much as you might think. i think it’s important. it’s one of those things where tom people would rather have more asphalt. >> the second part of this question was, i anchor of 4:00 news every day, we’re always checking out the traffic cameras from four to five. there are trouble spots every day at about 4:40 for 5:00. i 10 and mccray and y yarrow. >> we want to start using some of the prop 1 money, we think we’ll have that approval by the end of this year. >> the toll lane on chavez isn’t used yet because it generally has free flow of traffic. as we grow, though, there will be more growth of traffic? what if we were to remove the toll roads and later the seizer chavez roads would be incredibly congested? >> it’s a possibility but we already know there’s not as nurture traffic on any road that’s called a nontolled roads. you’re going force the nontolled lane becomes kind of for those who want to pay the extra, we found in this other cities, as well. san antonio just because one and reversed one for that same reason. austin, right now they are locked in. we will look back at a state and pat approximate 1. repairing them to bring a plan on how to reboot all the of the state-operated tolls. >> this is a different message than what we heard a few year always, when toll going. there was a lot of arm twisting, and san antonio is now the second living city in oregon coast and they have for toll. >> let go to george in the lower valley on the phone. what’s your comment or your question? >> my question is in respect to the lower valley. alameda and north loop are inundated. when are you going to put some funds to extend the border high from the. >> all way to the situations. please address the question. >> there’s a lot of talk about the border highway west extension but there are a lot of people who want to extend it east, as well. >> there’s a group called mpo, metropolitan planning organization, that’s where mostly elected officials from this region can clear once a month. a study was approval going all the way to the county lawn. federal government require the a four-year plan where we know they have of the membership in the tang. we have to show where the money’s coming. from again, with prop 1 and prop 7, we’re going to be able to bring a lot of those projects ford. all the regions including ours are required to have a 10 everplan. the state of texas separates with a 10 you’re plan they beef triever to agree a dollar amount. it’s been really rough for alameda north over the last several years. a lot is because of the drainage and the right of way acquisition, it’s pretty expensive. >> we have a tweet actually from henry saying, can you ask him who owns alameda avenue. it’s a state road. and when will it get drainages and be rebuilt we have some in our long term plan but we don’t have a definitive a. alameda is a state road but we refer to the cities. because there’s been building over the years we need to do it, we have to do. with all the tea party republicans in the texas legislature, how did we end up with such an unsustainable funding? >> they were asleep, they actually came in after the fact. i thought the question would be how did we get prop 7 through the legislature. that actually was more of a trick than anything else. the dead was turned off by a democrat, not a republican, which is kind of unusual. >> right. >> in and of itself. but actually, you know, the tea party, republican party, democratic party, transportation hasn’t been as i guess contention within — as, say, education? >> right. >> so your are bringing transportation including 750 house methods. we only had one stepping vote on problem 7? >>. it took a regular session and three special together the to get that one through. when the public supported that 80%, everybody stood up and noticed, this is something that’s important to constituents all over the state of — you know, we have all flavors right now. >> there’s an argument that says sometimes you said they were asleep, legislators were asleep about this unsustainable funding formula, that in the texas legislature they spend a lot of time focusing on social issues that get a lot of news coverage, control stuff. >> when there’s really important administrator funding type things required for transportation. >> we haven’t raised gas taxis since 1991. nobody wants to raise anything. but how many business could say taken self’s for not increasing what you charge their customers, 24 or five years. any i’m it’s proposed it’s shot down by the ultra conservative act. we’ve only been borrowing money for transportation for 10 years. that’s why we need to turn it off and kind of get back to the pay as you go metal. be a long, long time away. >> we borrowed in a and it’s going to cost $31 billion with interest. >> sue, what’s your comment or your question? >> why haven’t we made three-lane each direction from el el paso out to the state line into mexico? and yes. >> haven’t they completed could, 180 ward’s carlsbad into a four-lane? >> it’s an easy answer but not easy to assessment we just don’t have the money. prop 7 will get us a lot of those projects, as far as 6180, which is montana to most of us, going out to carlsbad. that will go into another texas do the district. of as 375 near mex. we have to mind those events. >> i’d like to know why don’t they chop up all the tired that we have and put them on the road, some of us are doing. >> you mean the chrome rubber, or n. >> you would not have to make an often. this type of projects would probably help the road. >> do you mean taking the old tires and we calls approach hurry. we only do it very, very limited aren’t state because it’s so spencer and we don’t have fliers to do it for us. it doesn’t extend the life of the mail. i. utah really kind of done with test modes right now. >> when we get back we’ll get to maria in president lower valley and more on your tweets. i’m have to ask you. >> thank you so much, let’s go to maria in the lower valley. hi, marieia, what’s your comment or question? >> my question is on alameda, will the construction stop at fox plaza? or are we able to see more construction all the way to america? we are in desperate need for drainages and sidewalks. we have none. if you could please address that. thank you. bye-bye. >> thank you very much. >> yes. >> , as i said earlier we probably don’t have as much as we need to from the fox plaza area going out towards lee trevino. the plan is more from there out towards the county line. from there it’s all a function of money. and we, the mpo, when the new money starts to come in, will be hopefully fighting over it, which is a good thing. hopefully we can get more of the alameda and north projects rising to the top. but we need the money first. the answer to the question, help us out, vote for prop 7 and give us state of oregon fight over right now. we’re fighting over little bits and pieces. it would be nice to have an extra $30 million to $50 million here in el el paso. >> first, thank you, mr. pickett for doing such a good job as a representative. you are the only one we feel good about continuing to vote for during the election cycle. it would have been good to address the city roads, procrast another sunday. we’re working on having the city manager tommy gonzalez here in a couple weeks, as well. >> i used to be on city council. it’s tough. >> i remember. >> you’re on the metropolitan planning organization, you mentioned it earlier. the city has come under the microscope recently for presenting projects for funding that were not ready. recently one of those projects was the pedestrian project in the lower valley wasn’t ready. but from what i understand about a million dollars was still appropriated for it in the future. >> and i’m part of the problem on that. i think that’s an important project on that, that we need to keep. but you have to understand that federal dollars have very specific criteria. congestion mitigation and air quality money comes to us. we asked texas-dot can we turn in some of this congestion mitigation and air quality money. we’re asking this tomorrow turn it in, and they are able to do that. and they divert that money into i different type? right now just three communities get it. jib just asks for it, it’s kind of dangerous to do. the project is something that people talked to me in that area wad we don’t have projects that we could spend that money on today. i wish we could, i wish it it was just as easy as just to do another project. we’ve got stp, border infrastructure funds, we’ve got noble suspends. and all of them have very strict criteria. the goose thing, hopefully it pasts, we would be able to use for almost any type of project. >> state representative blanco talks about something completely different. >> he talked about governor’s gunshots answer with the mpo, and that money could have gone to other projects in the far fewer for other communities. he’s relatively new at some things. but we talked at that category at some length. we department of even have today’s prongs. that money and the used ford. >> i showed some folks the letter, to change it for other money. again, that’s danger for us to do. my deal is to try and keep as much money into this region as possible. >> okay. speaking of that, that great segue into our last twin cities, you have mentioned several i’m sure the good thing is, the speaker appointed me chairman of a collect committee to look at the did you noting floors. the legislature has gotten involved and we’re going to be doing the same thing for prop seven. it’s going to be. everybody in the state of texas is getting a portion of the money, including el el paso. i feel very, very good about the work we’re if you had, we’ll have between now and then to pose the new changes in the funding. >> election day is november 3rd, early voting starts monday october 19th. thank you so much, representative pickett, we appreciate it. >> let us gets the money and then fight over it. thank you so much for joining us and thank you so much for joing us here on