Who is a member?
Our members are the local governments of Massachusetts and their elected and appointed leadership.
His Excellency Deval L. Patrick
Governor of the Commonwealth
State House, Boston
Dear Governor Patrick,
On behalf of cities and towns across the Commonwealth, the Massachusetts Municipal Association respectfully and urgently asks you to sign H. 3379, legislation to provide $300 million for the Chapter 90 program to maintain and repair local roads. The Legislature passed the measure with a unanimous vote, reflecting the critical importance that Chapter 90 commands in maintaining and rebuilding our vital transportation infrastructure. Communities are depending on swift action on this issue, so that the important work of rebuilding and restoring our local roads, bridges and infrastructure can begin now, and make full use of the remainder of the 2013 construction season.
We are deeply grateful to you for embracing a much-needed 50 percent increase in Chapter 90 funding and making this a central component of your impressive and visionary transportation improvement framework. This is an essential step that will bring cities and towns much closer to the funding level needed to maintain municipal roadways in a state of good repair, the industry standard for ensuring well-maintained roads in good condition. The $300 million funding level is also vitally important because citizens and businesses from all corners of the Commonwealth will be contributing more of their tax dollars to fund transportation improvements, and Chapter 90 is the one program that will provide taxpayers in every single community with a share of this investment.
The MMA applauds your extraordinary leadership in addressing our state’s transportation finance needs now and into the future. The Legislature is on the verge of enacting a comprehensive framework of revenues and legislative actions to act on the immediate and long-term transportation crisis facing Massachusetts, and this would not have been possible without the efforts of you and your Administration. We note that there clearly is adequate new revenue in the House and Senate transportation finance bills before the conference committee to finance the debt service for this one-year, fiscal 2014 $300 million Chapter 90 bond bill, and the Legislature’s clear intent is to use the new revenue to support this legislation. We look forward to working with you and the Legislature on the multi-year bond bill that will be considered later this session, so that $300 million is authorized and funded for fiscal 2015 and future years as well.
Cities and towns are responsible for maintaining, repairing and rebuilding nearly 90 percent of the roadways in Massachusetts. By paving the way for new Chapter 90 authorizations you will ensure that local transportation needs are met, and cities and towns will be able to fulfill their vital obligation to maintain the transportation infrastructure that is essential for public safety, commerce and everyday living.
Under state law and custom, the intent is to enact Chapter 90 funding and provide cities and towns with official notice of their allocation by April 1 of each year, to give communities adequate time to plan and use their Chapter 90 funds during the entire construction season. Municipalities cannot sign contracts or borrow against their anticipated Chapter 90 funds until they receive these official letters of authorization, and any delay can stall projects and dramatically shorten the construction season for every community across the state. When the construction season is shortened, important projects are delayed until the next year, driving up costs and adding to the deterioration of local roads.
Thus, H. 3379 is very timely, and we respectfully urge you to swiftly sign the bill into law, and file the “terms bill” that must be enacted before MassDOT can release the final $300 million authorization to cities and towns, which then would allow important local projects in local communities to move forward right away.
We note that in each of the past two years, there has been a long delay in the actual release of the funds, in part because of the time-consuming second step in the process, passing a terms bill. The terms bill authorizes the State Treasurer to issue bonds to fund the Chapter 90 program after the bond bill becomes law. The terms bill can only be filed after the Chapter 90 bond bill has been signed into law. Cities and towns have had to wait until August to receive their funds from the Department of Transportation, causing localities across the state to miss a significant portion of the all-too-short local construction season in 2011 and 2012.
We are asking that you sign this year’s Chapter 90 bond bill as quickly as possible and that the Chapter 90 terms bill be filed and acted on immediately after the bond bill becomes law, so that you can then take the third and final step of having MassDOT release the full $300 million authorization to cities and towns. That will mark the true start of the 2013 construction season.
The Need for Funding Chapter 90 at $300 Million a Year
As you know, cities and towns are responsible for 30,000 miles of roads in the Commonwealth – approximately 90 percent of our state’s roadways – and communities depend on the Chapter 90 reimbursement program to maintain and repair their roads, making Chapter 90 a vital element in any transportation funding plan. The state created the Chapter 90 program in 1973 to share a portion of gas tax revenues with communities to ensure adequate resources for local road construction needs. But 40 years later, even at $200 million a year, funding for the Chapter 90 program is far short of the actual need, because construction costs have escalated sharply over the decades, in great part due to significant increases in the cost of fossil fuels, which drives up the price of construction materials such as asphalt and steel.
In December 2012, the MMA released a report documenting that cities and towns across the state face an annual shortfall of $362 million in the funding needed to maintain municipal roadways in a state of good repair, the industry standard, even with the Chapter 90 program at its current $200 million level. Funding the Chapter 90 program at $300 million a year will close a portion of this huge gap.
The MMA collected data from cities and towns across the state, and that information revealed that communities in Massachusetts need to spend $562 million every year to rebuild and maintain local roads in a state of good repair, but communities spend far less because of inadequate resources and because, for most localities, Chapter 90 is the only source of funds for road maintenance. Under Proposition 2½, cities and towns are unable to increase the amount of local funds to supplement Chapter 90 unless they cut other important services, such as public safety or education, or pass a tax override, increasing local reliance on the already overburdened property tax. The result is seen in potholes and crumbling roads across the state.
Chapter 90 Provides Regional Equity and Immediate Results Across the State
In addition, increasing Chapter 90 to $300 million a year will yield immediate benefits and address a major goal of transportation reform: regional equity. The Chapter 90 program is the most effective and efficient way to ensure regional equity and regional access to increased transportation tax revenues. Cities and towns receive their funds through a tried-and-true formula that shares revenues in a fair way in every corner of the Commonwealth. Plus, cities and towns face such a backlog of need that the increase will immediately result in visible and necessary construction and repair projects on local roads across Massachusetts.
Further, investing more in Chapter 90 funding to improve the quality of local roads will actually save taxpayers millions of dollars a year. According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, once a local road is in a state of good repair, every dollar invested to keep it properly maintained will save 6 to 10 dollars in avoided repair costs that become necessary to rebuild the road when it fails due to a lack of maintenance.
Investing in transportation is essential for our state’s economic growth and competitiveness, and the fact that our state leaders are embracing this task is good news for every resident, taxpayer, business owner and community in the Commonwealth.
We look forward to working in partnership with you to advance all components of a balanced and sweeping transportation package, including new tax revenues, maintenance and repairs to our current infrastructure, program expansion and proposed reforms. H. 3379 is an outstanding start to fixing the state’s transportation finance crisis.
Thank you very much.
Sincerely,
Geoffrey C. Beckwith
Executive Director
cc: Secretary Glen Shor, Executive Office for Administration and Finance
Secretary Richard A. Davey, Massachusetts Department of Transportation