It’s a good strategy, but it also clears the way for the necessary and critical debate about the future of the state’s roads and bridges, the infrastructure where taxpayers have invested billions of dollars over the years.

Dayton held a news conference Tuesday detailing the plan and arguing these projects won’t happen if the Legislature doesn’t approve his proposal for road funding. … Republican leaders chimed in right away saying the projects would also get done under their plan, which invests a lower amount.

But Dayton’s plan would get the projects done more quickly and that is the critical issue. The 600-project list includes at least some roads that are in what MnDOT describes as “very poor” condition. Roads that degrade to that level are much more expensive to fix than fixing roads in only “poor” condition. MnDOT has estimated that a road in very poor condition will cost $1 million per mile to fix while other roads not quite as bad would cost $500,000 per mile.

Dayton also was criticized for playing politics with the road funding as some described it as a way to dangle projects in front of constituencies to build support. If that’s his strategy, so be it. That’s the way democracy is supposed to work.

Minnesota road funding has often been approved throughout history under a cloak of secrecy, with leaders of both parties saying detailing road projects would not only politicize the process but take that power away from the experts who know the road needs.

The whole idea that road funding decisions aren’t or shouldn’t be politicized has long been a fallacy. Remember the override veto deal that suddenly brought funding for completion of a state highway project to a certain southern Minnesota legislator’s district?

Dayton is just being more upfront about the political nature of road funding. It’s important, however, that the list was developed by MnDOT experts and engineers. It’s their best take on what needs to be done and they offer bottom-line reasons for those decisions. They set priorities.

The projects were selected based on those critically in need of repair, those in very poor condition. MnDOT reports that 4,370 miles of Minnesota roads will be at the end of their useful life in the next 10 years, thereby in the so called worse MnDOT road rating of “very poor.”

The plan also makes longer term fixes on current road projects so they will not need fixing in a few years. It also funds a prevention program to avoid roads falling into such high degrees of disrepair they cost more in the long run.

There are also plans for strategic expansion of some highways that will help move commerce and reduce money lost by the private sector via traffic congestion. The governor’s plan also allocated $1.6 billion to the Corridors of Commerce plan that operates with bonding money and has been used to help fund the expansion of Highway 14 in southern Minnesota.

About 72 percent of the projects on the list are in greater Minnesota while the rest are in the seven county metro area.

One might argue the governor is trying to get the votes of Republican House members from those rural Minnesota districts they won during last election, by suggesting there are projects that will benefit their constituents. That’s a legitimate argument. That’s how it’s supposed to work.

If those legislators have a better plan to fund roads and that will fund 80 percent of the projects instead of 100 percent, it will be good those constituents know that.

Dayton’s list leads the way for an important debate. It’s not any more political than it has been in the past, but it is more open.

 

— Mankato Free Press, Feb. 17