Gov.’s Turnaround on Roads Is Right Move

Score a point for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Score a bunch of points.

Score him points for budgeting, for policy and for politics.

It shows why a California governor can never be counted out. Most any governor can bounce back, especially a celebrity governor, even if he has lost a third of his popular support since January, according to polls.

Governors have phenomenal power, including the ability to spend big money on popular projects. Like building roads.

Spending for schools also is popular, but its mere mention evokes controversy -- and some demagoguery -- about alleged waste, incompetence and greed.

Try to talk up repairing the safety net for welfare families, the elderly poor and the disabled, and a lot of taxpayers roll their eyes. Moreover, unlike the education and highway lobbies, poor people don’t ingratiate themselves to politicians by contributing money to their election campaigns.

Highway projects are universally popular -- motherhood and apple pie -- unless somebody’s trying to build a freeway down a beach or across a wilderness. Most people, regardless of finances or politics, get stuck in traffic, bounce over potholes and demand help from the government.

Schwarzenegger provided some help last week, although what he did was much less than advertised. All he really did was back off his plan to again raid the transportation kitty and seize $1.3 billion for other purposes -- the main purpose being to avoid a tax increase.

He’s still avoiding a tax increase, but by continuing to renege on his promise to repay schools a borrowed $2 billion.

Let’s back up: Californians in 2002 voted overwhelmingly, 69% to 31%, to spend the state’s gasoline sales tax for transportation projects. That was Proposition 42 and it was logical: Taxes paid at the pump should be spent on the road.

But there were loopholes. Sacramento got into deficit-spending. And Prop. 42 never has been fully implemented. Desperate Gray Davis and the Legislature grabbed $868 million of the Prop. 42 money in 2003 to spend on other programs. Last year, Schwarzenegger confiscated the entire $1.2 billion pot.

Introducing a new budget in January, Schwarzenegger again proposed to “suspend” Prop. 42 and seize its $1.3 billion. But with higher-than-expected income tax revenue pouring into the treasury, the governor changed his mind last week and decided to allow the $1.3 billion to be spent solely on transportation -- as the people had voted.

Anyone who knew this history while listening to Schwarzenegger’s weekly radio address Saturday couldn’t help but sadly conclude that he was being -- to put it politely -- disingenuous. This is what he told the radio audience:

“The people voted to have [gas] tax money used for transportation. But the politicians, of course, had other ideas. They raided transportation funds to cover the deficits and their reckless spending. And our roads and infrastructure have suffered.”

The guy just can’t resist beating up on fellow politicians, still in denial that he is one himself. Shamefully, Schwarzenegger is the politician who is most guilty of the sin he condemns. It was he who led the biggest raid.

Whatever. Schwarzenegger does deserve credit for reversing himself.

It’s good budgeting because much of the new tax revenue looks suspiciously like a one-time bump. Highway construction involves only one-time expenditures. So this avoids repeating what got Sacramento into a spending hole: using one-time revenue for ongoing programs.

If Sacramento were to pour all that money into schools, it could be on the hook for the same amount each year afterward under Proposition 98.

Also, by spending the $1.3 billion on transportation, it means the state isn’t borrowing more money from the Prop. 42 kitty and adding to its already ludicrous debt. The state still will owe the Prop. 42 fund $2.1 billion. Schwarzenegger wants to repay it over 15 years.

Schwarzenegger’s backtracking is good public policy, as is obvious to millions of frustrated motorists. L.A. and Orange counties have the nation’s worst traffic congestion, according to a recent Texas A&M; study. The San Francisco-Oakland area has the second worst.

Because of funding raids, no new major highway projects have been authorized in nearly two years. In fact, the California Transportation Commission was on the verge of scratching projects off the construction wait list.

“We’ve got nearly a bankrupt transportation system,” says Senate transportation committee Chairman Tom Torlakson (D-Antioch). “This is a positive step [by the governor], but it’s a small step in a bigger journey to adequately fund our transportation infrastructure.”

Right, but this also is a good political move by Schwarzenegger.

It pleases his biggest ally, the business lobby, which sees economic development being choked by traffic congestion.

It reduces the target for Democrats, especially state Treasurer Phil Angelides. He’s running for governor and attacking Schwarzenegger for not investing in California’s infrastructure.

It erases some talking points for Democratic legislative leaders, who have been pounding the governor on transportation and pushing their own funding plans.

But Schwarzenegger, in his revised budget, still is shortchanging schools and weakening the safety net for the poor and the disabled. He’ll need to compromise on these issues before Democrats let him ring up all those points for road building.

George Skelton writes Monday and Thursday. Reach him at george.skelton@latimes.com.