While there are other issues to be decided Nov. 5, the only controversial issue is the sales tax referendum.
Last year the General Assembly voted to allow residents in Northern Virginia and in the Hampton Roads area to decide whether to raise the sales tax by one half cent to defray the cost of regional transportation improvements. Proponents say that this will bring needed funds into the region to begin to solve some of the transportation snarl. Fairfax County, Arlington and Alexandria have voted overwhelmingly to endorse the referendum.
Sen. Linda T. “Toddy” Puller laid out the case for the referendum in a recent issue of the Gazette. “Northern Virginia has the third worst traffic congestion in the nation,” Puller said. “Commuters now spend 84 hours a year on average stuck in traffic gridlock…”
“More than 40 percent of the new money raised, if the referendum is approved will go to improve and build new mass transit across the region. The investment is pro environment, providing money for new transit projects, upgrading older Metro facilities, expanding the Virginia Railway Express and offering more convenient bus service. The referendum will create $5 billion over 20 years of new revenues for mass transit and specific roadway improvements to relieve congestion and improve safety…”
WRITERS OF LETTERS to the editor in the Gazette have voiced their opinions. David Lampo is opposed to the referendum. “Toddy Puller is dead wrong that the proposed sales tax increase is going to make any difference in our daily commutes, any more than the last sales tax increase in 1986 did,” Lampo said in his letter. “…Puller and the others are simply trying to mask their own fiscal irresponsibility by blaming us for our transportation woes if we don’t vote for their tax increase.”
Tom Vinciguerra, another letter contributor is also opposed to the referendum. “…The burden for solving the deplorable transportation crisis in Northern Virginia should not be foisted on the shoulders of the folks who can least afford it, working people. “Sales tax is, and always has been, an easy way out for government leaders to end-run around fiscal responsibility.”
VIRGINIA DELEGATE Kris Amundson, like Puller, supports the referendum. “First of all, it is absolutely clear when you talk to people that the quality of life is simply degrading because of the time that people spend in traffic.” she said. “ I hear about people who couldn’t get to a soccer game or missed seeing their child walk on stage as the fourth elf in the play and it’s because they were stuck in traffic. Parents are getting up and leaving their house at 4 a.m. to avoid traffic and I wonder what kind of family life that leaves you. The answer is none.
"It is also clear to me that it’s costing our region money. There are businesses now that won’t have their trucks on the road at certain times and that won’t deliver to Maryland because they can’t get their people back. I certainly have heard anecdotal evidence that there are people who have refused jobs because of the traffic.
"I think people need to ask themselves, in your own life, how has your life changed because of traffic. There isn’t a person in Washington who hasn’t coped with this. That is the reason that people came to the General Assembly and said we have to do something.
“The package that’s out there, the money that’s raised in Northern Virginia stays in this region. The decision about how the money will be spent is a group of elected officials in Northern Virginia. That’s good because we know those people and we know where they live. This is getting those decisions made as close to home as they can be made.
“Finally, and particularly for an area like ours where people rely on mass transit or would like to, there is a huge amount of money in this referendum for mass transit. The official legislation says a minimum of 40 percent will go to mass transit but the NVTA says the goal is to be closer to 50 percent. As I look at the financial situation in the state, I can’t see any other way that we are going to see anything that comes close to that."
AMUNDSON continued by saying, “From a school perspective, we all know about the terrific teacher that gets our kids excited and after three years says I can’t stay and if I transfer to the western end of the county I will be able to spend more time with my own kids. I don’t want that to keep happening.”
Amundson also is concerned about the other two statewide bond issues that are on the November ballot. “While people can have honest disagreements over the sales tax referendum, I can think of no one who disagrees with the other two bond issues,” she said. “I’m just worried that people are going to forget about the other bond issues. They will fund capital projects for our colleges and universities and will pay for some additional capital expenditures in our parks and recreation centers.
"Our universities and colleges are the jewel in our educational crown but if we do not take care of them, we are going to lose good professors and students. I can see no other way to fund these projects than through these bonds.”