Governor Deal Squashes Plans For Another Transportation Referendum

“I see no sense in revisiting an issue that the public has rather resoundingly expressed their opinion on.”

Metro Atlanta voters killed the one percent sales tax increase by a stunning margin of 26 points.

Governor Deal now says the state will be rearranging transportation priorities and will adopt a more centralized decision-making process.

“When you have to make these decisions they are very difficult and sometimes that can be only be made in the context of a smaller group.”

In wake of the T-SPLOST defeat in metro Atlanta and given the prospect of a significant reduction in federal transportation funds, Deal said local projects would fall under intense scrutiny. But Deal did call out the Ga. 400 and I-285 interchange project as being high-priority moving forward.

“With the removal of the toll on [Georgia] 400 at the end of next year, I think the natural consequence will be that we will see traffic increase on that roadway and as a result of that, that interchange, I think, is even more important perhaps than it would have been otherwise.”

Several groups that led efforts to defeat the T-SPLOST, including the Sierra Club and the Atlanta Tea Party, have called for a host of reforms to the Georgia Department of Transportation and MARTA. They’ve also suggested restructuring the state’s gas tax and shoring up MARTA operations with Atlanta’s hotel tax.  

Deal didn’t take anything off the table, but he urged a cautious approach.

“I think we have to very very careful that we don’t rob Peter to pay Paul just because we’ve had a downturn in revenue for transportation.”

In any event, transportation projects will grow more expensive for Metro Atlanta. Localities that voted down the T-SPLOST will now have to provide 30 percent of total project costs to get the rest from the state. Localities that passed the T-SPLOST will only have to provide 10 percent.