Ferguson Urges Unifying Transportation Panels

Orange County authorities need to consolidate and streamline the area’s transportation agencies before local residents will support ballot measures that would increase taxes to cure the area’s transportation ills, Assemblyman Gil Ferguson (R-Newport Beach) said Friday.

The public “might not all be rocket scientists, but they have a sense that no one’s in charge” of transportation planning in the county, said Ferguson, an Assembly Transportation Committee member and co-author of a pending bill that would combine the county Transportation Commission and the Transit District into one agency.

His comments came in an interview after a three-hour hearing at the Hall of Administration in Santa Ana that was attended by half a dozen members of the county’s state legislative delegation. The special session was organized by Ferguson to allow the public and local officials a chance to discuss county transportation problems.

Ferguson said he thinks that support in the county for a state gasoline tax increase on the June ballot and a proposed countywide sales tax boost to fund freeway construction and other transportation improvements hinges in part on whether transportation officials can upgrade their performance.

He also called on California Department of Transportation officials in the county to develop “a better, more responsive working relationship” with local city and county officials.

Several local officials voiced similar concerns, suggesting that a single agency needs to take command of the county’s transportation future.

Supervisor Roger R. Stanton said there is too much confusion, overlapping authority and “buck passing” under the existing setup, which features the county Transportation Commission handling many long-range planning issues while the Transit District oversees the bulk of county bus service.

“The blurring of authority causes confusion among everyone,” Stanton said, adding that a new agency would result in “greater accountability and a sense of purpose . . . and hopefully better use of the transportation dollar.”

Other officials focused on a need for more money to pay for highway construction work and other projects needed to ease the traffic snarls now endemic to the region.

“Revenue is the significant issue,” said Bruce Nestande, a former county supervisor now on the California Transportation Commission. “We’ve all wasted money. . . . We’ve all got inefficiencies. But we can’t let it become an excuse not to pursue the financing issue.”

Some, however, suggested that money does not represent the only solution to the county’s traffic mess.

Jack Mallincrodt, a director of Drivers for Highway Safety, a county-based group opposed to car-pool lanes, said transportation officials should strive for more “cost-effective” solutions.

He said car-pool lanes, which are restricted to vehicles with two or more occupants, should be opened to all traffic, which he contends would ease congestion and reduce air pollution.

Slow-growth advocate Tom Rogers, meanwhile, said that to gain support of voters, legislation to manage growth must be tied to any funding package that goes on the ballot.