The concept of “fix-it-first” has been very prominent in pro-Measure B mailings and publicity. This is not surprising, since maintaining roadways ranked very high in the surveys Sacramento Transportation Authority (SacTA) conducted to determine support for the measure, and nearly all people, regardless of preferred mode of transportation or political persuason agree that our roads should be maintained in a state of good repair. Anyone who has hit a pothole, whether in a car or bus or on bike or in a wheelchair, knows that many roads in the county are in horrible condition, particularly those in the unincorporated county. Not only are the roads rough right now, but they are in accelerating decline since broken pavement leads to water infiltration and undermining. Many roads are past the point of repair, and must be replaced.

Fix-it-first sounds great, but peal back the layers of caveats, and Measure B does not really have much commitment to fix-it-first:

• The fix-it-first commitment only lasts for five years. For the remaining 25 years of the sales tax measure, there is no commitment to fix-it-first.
• Only 75% of funds must be spent on fix-it-first in the first five years.
• Any entity that claims it meets an average pavement condition index of 70 does not need to spend on maintenance. Folsom and Rancho Cordova have already claimed that they meet this requirement. The pavement condition index is on a scale of 0 to 100, with 100 being a newly paved road. An average of 70 means that on average, the roads are so-so, and that some roads are much worse.
• Any entity may exempt itself from the fix-it-first requirement by a 2/3 vote to move funds from maintenance to other projects.

The fix-it-first requirements for Sacramento Regional Transit are considerably stricter than for road projects, and it is unlikely that SacRT will be able to meet the performance metrics for fare recovery, ridership, and reserve set in the measure, so SacRT will be subject to fix-it-first for the full five years.

If the past is any guide to how SacTA, the county, and the cities will handle maintenance, it is likely that they will slide back into the past practice of deferring maintenance, that got us into the current mess of poor road conditions in the first place. Repaved roads do not get ribbon cuttings, but new roads and interchanges and freeway lanes do get ribbon cuttings, so unless there  really is a binding commitment to fix-it-first, funds will go to other priorities.

It has been estimated that there is at least $804 million in deferred maintenance needs in the county. If the entities spent 75% of the $2.2 billion local roads allocation for five out of the 30 years, only $275 million would be spent on maintenance, leaving a shortfall of $529 million [decimal point mistake corrected; deferred maintenance mistake corrected]. Will SacTA be back with another tax proposal to cover that?

It you would like to see our current roadways maintained, before new roads and interchanges and freeway lanes that we can’t really afford to build, and certainly cannot afford to maintain, then Measure B is not the path to that goal.

Sacramento County is not alone is the challenge of maintaining roads, it is a national crisis. Estimates have been made that to maintain the infrastructure we already have, we would have to double tax rates across the board, not just transportation sales tax, but all taxes. We have over-built the private vehicle portion of our transportation network, and under-built the transit, bicycling, and walking portion. It will be hard to dig out of the deferred maintenance hole we have created, but at least let’s not dig the hole deeper.

• Measure B 2016