Ticking Package

Sacramento, capital of mystery and intrigue, has given Californians yet another puzzle to ponder: Why would Gov. George Deukmejian, who has spent a political lifetime creating a reputation as the State Tightwad, want to spend $1.70 for a dollar’s worth of highway?

Of many possible explanations, the most likely is that he is offering taxpayers a package that will buy two things: faster work on highway improvements, and a little more time during which he can say that he never raised taxes. It is a package that taxpayers should soak in water for a long time before they open it.

The governor wants to issue $2.3 billion in general-obligation bonds to be used over five years and paid for over 20 years. Revenue from the bonds combined with the $1 billion a year already generated by the state’s 9-cent gasoline tax would allow the California Department of Transportation to spend about $1.4 billion a year on highway improvements--double-decking, relatively short stretches of new freeway and the like--between now and the mid 1990s. There are two problems with the governor’s proposal.

It would increase by nearly half the amount of money available for highways, but because of the interest on the bonds it also would increase by nearly half the price that California would pay for the extra highway funds. It also is not enough to do the job right. Caltrans has about $7 billion worth of highway work on its drawing boards for Southern California alone--money that the Southern California Assn. of Governments says would, with luck, keep commuters about where they are now, making the trips to and from work no better or no worse than they are now.

Philosophically, Deukmejian is right when he says that smooth transportation is essential to the prosperity of all Californians, including those who do not or cannot drive. Not only would a better transportation network facilitate the comings and goings of commuters, it also would mean happier trails for the trucks that move the products and produce that are the base of California’s economy in which everybody--driver or not--shares. But issuing bonds should not be used as a means of preventing higher taxes. Bonds should be reserved for projects that are needed now but for which there is a direct connection between the bonds and a source of revenue--as in bonds that help California veterans buy homes--or for projects that are needed now but for which there is no easy way to assign costs and benefits--as in parks, water projects and school construction.

In the case of transportation, the money that Deukmejian wants to raise with a bond issue could be raised not only for five years but indefinitely with a 4-cent increase in the gasoline tax, each penny of which yields about $120 million a year. Not only that, every penny would go directly into highway work and none to interest payments.

Deukmejian’s proposal is attractive only by comparison with the plan of Sen. Wadie P. Deddeh (D-Chula Vista). He would issue revenue bonds, backed by income from the gasoline tax, and raise the tax to whatever level was needed to pay off the bonds, providing the worst of all possible worlds.

Caltrans estimates that the state gasoline tax should be 22 cents today just to match the purchasing power of the 6-cent tax in 1960. Sacramento, capital of mystery and intrigue, should leap at the chance to demonstrate its eagerness to meet its responsibility to serve the public by raising the gasoline tax by a mere 4 cents. It would save California taxpayers money. In the bargain it might also cut down ever so slightly on the miles that Californians drive, if not on the amount of pavement that they need for driving.