Consolidation of Toll Road Groups Sought : Transportation: Laguna Niguel mayor, angered by high salaries and bonuses, asks fellow council members to start talks on merger of tollway agencies.

Outraged by huge salaries, bonuses and perks at Orange County’s public toll road agencies, Laguna Niguel Mayor Mark Goodman has asked his colleagues on the City Council to initiate discussions that could lead to the merger of the tollway boards and three other transportation agencies.

“There is no valid reason not to consolidate,” Goodman said, “except that it will take away some power and prestige of individual board members.”

Laguna Niguel council members, who were expected to discuss the issue late Tuesday night, sit on both the Orange County Transportation Authority and one of two toll road boards, while Goodman is a project manager in the transportation authority’s Maintenance Department.

He is asking that the transportation authority and the toll road boards be merged with the Laguna Beach Transit District and the county’s Transportation Department. If the agencies can agree on a merger, Goodman has suggested putting the specific makeup of the board to an advisory vote in November.

Goodman has the backing of Orange County Supervisor Marian Bergeson, who is seeking to restructure county government, and who sits on the transportation authority and on both toll road boards.

“I think we really need to relook at the consolidation issue, understanding the toll roads may have some special debt obligations that should prevail,” she said in a recent interview.

In a letter to his fellow council members distributed Tuesday, Goodman said he has been a proponent of merging the agencies since 1987, when he served as an alternate member of the Transportation Corridor Agencies, the boards that oversee California’s first public toll roads. Goodman was an aide to then-Supervisor Thomas F. Riley.

“The recent revelations regarding cost overruns, schedule delays and pay increases at the TCA has again brought this issue to the forefront,” he wrote.

“In this time of public outcry for more efficient, centralized government, it is incredible that in Orange County, we have at least four agencies overseeing transportation projects and services.”

The Times reported last week that over a six-year period in which the county went through recession and bankruptcy, the Transportation Corridor Agencies lavished on their employees $94,804 in cash bonuses and merit raises, a $190,000 home loan for one administrator and $175,400 in compensation to its chief executive officer.

At the same time, construction of the toll roads in southern and eastern Orange County generally fell two to four years behind schedule and the cost estimate nearly doubled to $4 billion, documents show. Toll road officials said the delays were unavoidable and the salaries and perks were necessary to recruit the best talent available.

The issue of merging the toll road agencies with other transportation entities to improve accountability was raised in the late 1980s, when officials explored merging the Orange County Transportation Commission with the Orange County Transit District. The two agencies were combined in 1991 and called the Orange County Transportation Authority.

Stan Oftelie, the authority’s executive director, said the idea of absorbing the toll road agencies has not been broached for about five years, because toll road officials have insisted that their boards must remain intact to deal with financial and land-use issues specific to the tollways.

The boards are composed of about a dozen elected officials who represent the county and cities through which the toll roads pass. Tollway officials say any merger would have to include the same basic membership.

“It comes down to governance and all the cities who are in the area of benefit for the toll road have to have representation on the board,” said tollways spokeswoman Lisa Telles.

Oftelie believes that because most of the financing issues have been resolved and the only land-use issue has to do with the southern alignment of one toll road, it may be time to revisit the merger.

A public poll conducted by Oftelie’s agency two years ago showed strong support for merging the toll road boards and the Orange County Transportation Authority. Overall, 68% of those polled agreed with the merger.

At least one toll road board member is strongly opposed.

“This is an agency dedicated to building toll roads and will sunset at some point,” said Patricia C. Bates, a Laguna Niguel councilwoman and chairwoman of the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Agency. “We want to see early retirement of the bonds, not have tolls forever that would subsidize OCTA or transit projects.”