Yesterday the Senate Republican Caucus distributed the following press
release regarding a letter the caucus sent to the Governor urging him to release the full
amount of Chapter 90 funding for cities and towns:
Senate GOP
Caucus calls for release of Chapter 90 funding
Letter urges
Governor to distribute full $300 million to cities and towns
BOSTON
– The Massachusetts Senate Republican Caucus is calling on Governor Deval
Patrick to change his course and release the remaining half of the $300 million
in Chapter 90 bond funding unanimously approved by the Legislature for critical
infrastructure maintenance and repair funding for cities and towns. Patrick recently signed the legislation
appropriating the Chapter 90 money, but has thus far refused to release half of
it.
In a letter hand-delivered to the
Governor’s office on Monday afternoon, the Caucus warned Patrick that “Your
conditional release of only half of the funds not only puts our communities in
an untenable position of choosing what projects to fund and whether to build
half a bridge in the hopes that you will authorize the full amount, but it
further delays projects that need to begin if they are to be completed this
season.” The letter was signed by Senate
Minority Leader Bruce Tarr (R-Gloucester), Assistant Minority Leader Robert
Hedlund (R-Weymouth), Minority Whip Richard Ross (R-Wenham) and Senator Michael
Knapik (R-Westfield), the Ranking Republican on the Senate Committee on Ways
and Means.
Last month, Governor Patrick
informed municipalities that he would be authorizing the release of only $150
million of the $300 million in Chapter 90 funding approved by the Legislature. Senate Republicans are asking Patrick to
communicate any remaining concerns he has “so that we can address those
specific concerns and get this money to municipalities without any further
costly delay.”
“Municipal officials have repeatedly
heard the message that $300 million is coming to fund critical repairs to roads
and bridges, only to now receive half that amount in the middle of the
construction season,” noted Senator Tarr.
“The Governor filed a bill containing $300 million and the Legislature
approved that bill. Now it’s time to
honor those terms and move forward on the one funding item everyone has agreed
on, and continue debate, discussion and negotiations on the things on which we
haven’t agreed.”
“There’s
no practical reason our cities and towns should not receive these funds now,
which are desperately needed to fix our area roads,” added Senator Hedlund. “The only reason to withhold these funds
appears politically motivated and I do not believe cities and towns should
suffer from the political games being played on Beacon Hill.”
Based on the Patrick
Administration’s own recommendations, the House of Representatives and the
Senate unanimously approved $300 million for the Chapter 90 program, an
increase of $100 million over last year’s allocation for local road and bridge
repairs. Patrick signed the Chapter 90 bill
into law on May 24, and just last week the Legislature finalized an accompanying
terms bill dictating how the funds will be distributed.
“The release of these funds is
extremely important to our cities and towns as the construction season is
already underway,” said Senator Knapik.
“We must deliver on the full $300 million allocation to help maintain an
efficient and functional transportation infrastructure, one that is so critical
to the local economy.”
“This funding is crucial for
communities across the Commonwealth as construction season has begun and
municipalities are addressing their current transportation needs and projects,”
added Senator Ross. “Not only will this
funding enable cities and towns to maintain the safety and repair of local
roads and bridges, it will provide a necessary economic boost to the
construction industry and the Commonwealth’s economy as a whole.”
In
their letter, Senate Republicans called on Patrick to fulfill the state’s
commitment to assisting cities and towns in meeting their infrastructure needs.
“You
recognized in The Way Forward: A 21st
Century Transportation Plan, that previous commitments to road and bridge
funding have led to ‘safer roads, less congestion, and more comfortable
commutes for residents of every community in the Commonwealth,’” the Caucus
letter notes. “Arbitrarily abandoning
that commitment now jeopardizes those gains and will turn today’s
cost-efficient repairs into tomorrow’s unnecessary and unduly expensive roadway
replacements.”
A copy of the Caucus letter to
Governor Patrick is posted below.
###
June 10, 2013
His
Excellency Deval L. Patrick
Office
of the Governor
State
House Room 360
Boston,
MA 02133
Dear
Governor Patrick,
We are writing to respectfully
request the release of the full $300 million allocated for Chapter 90 funding
that was unanimously approved by the Legislature in House Bill 3379 and which
you signed into law on May 24, 2013. The
House and Senate’s prompt passage of the Chapter 90 Terms Bill last week
demonstrates our commitment to getting these needed funds out to our
communities as soon as possible. With
construction season fully underway, and the April 1 deadline to get notice to
municipalities of the amount allocated long past, we believe it is imperative
that $300 million be immediately released.
Your decision thus far to withhold
$150 million in Chapter 90 funding causes us great concern. The Senate and
House Ways and Means Committees have both determined that the $300 million
outlay is affordable. This figure has
been debated on both the House and Senate floors, with its prudence and
sustainability attested to by the members of the committee and the entire
Legislature. The $300 million figure had
its genesis in the bond bill filed by your Administration on March 13, 2013,
and you signified your assent to H.3379 when you signed it into law on May 24,
2013. Given the totality of these
approvals, cities and towns have an understandable expectation they will
receive the full $300 million. If now
you believe it was unwise to approve that funding, please communicate with us
immediately your remaining concerns so that we can address those specific
concerns and get this money to municipalities without any further costly
delay.
We firmly believe that a 25 percent
cut to road and bridge construction projects is both unnecessary and
imprudent. The spring construction
season is already well in progress, and municipalities are counting on the
timely release of this funding to begin and complete important road and bridge projects. Your conditional
release of only half of the funds not only puts our communities in an untenable
position of choosing what projects to fund and whether to build half a bridge
in the hopes that you will authorize the full amount, but it further delays
projects that need to begin if they are to be completed this season.
We certainly hope that the
withholding of half the Chapter 90 funding is not attributable to an effort to
expand upon the tax increases contained in transportation finance bills
approved by the House and the Senate.
Clearly any further increase in taxation is beyond the scope of what the
Legislature has approved and is in the realm of what the Legislature has
overwhelmingly rejected. The timing of
events demonstrates that no tax increase had been approved when you signed the
Chapter 90 bill into law, and the release of those funds should not now be
contingent upon a tax increase. Moreover, while we believe the tax increases
that have been approved will have serious adverse impacts on the commonwealth
and our uncertain economic recovery, it is clear that additional increases,
beyond what the House and Senate have approved, will imperil our economic
stability exponentially further. Each
branch of the Legislature has passed a transportation financing proposal that
raises over $500 million in new tax revenue.
Those proposals are the only
viable plans that are now on the table, and any new revenues now approved by
the Legislature could be applied to even further address the cost of the
Chapter 90 program.
You recognized in The Way Forward: A 21st Century
Transportation Plan, that previous commitments to road and bridge funding
have led to “safer roads, less congestion, and more comfortable commutes for
residents of every community in the Commonwealth.” Arbitrarily abandoning that commitment now
jeopardizes those gains and will turn today’s cost-efficient repairs into
tomorrow’s unnecessary and unduly expensive roadway replacements.
We believe the $300 million funding
allocation prudently respects the dramatic need for transportation improvements
in our cities and towns, the requests from our residents for the funding to
complete them, and the commitment implied by our actions to date on this
legislation. Additionally, the funding
will provide a needed economic stimulus to those in the construction industry
and the overall economy of the Commonwealth.
Accordingly, we respectfully ask that you authorize the release of the
full $300 million of Chapter 90 road and bridge funding.
Sincerely
,
Bruce
Tarr Robert
Hedlund
State
Senator State
Senator
Michael
Knapik Richard
Ross
State
Senator State
Senator
Cc: Senate President Therese Murray
Speaker of the House Robert A. DeLeo