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Haslam: Chattanooga road projects along I-24, I-75 would be helped with new road revenues
Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam may not feel so much like the Maytag repairman now.
The governor, who has been touring the state in an effort to drum up understanding about the funding of highways, initially must have felt as lonely on the road as the advertising repairman character. It's not like he was greeted at every stop with cheers and pats on the back, after all, when he talked about how the state would need new revenue to keep up the ever-increasing cost of highway maintenance.
Haslam, who has not specified one particular fix for the funding, is already opposed on a potential gas tax rise by 15 of 33 members in the state Senate and 40 of 99 members of the state House, according to an Americans for Prosperity-Tennessee list.
But Senate Speaker Ron Ramsey, R-Blountville, House Speaker Beth Harwell, R-Nashville, and Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Jim Tracy, R-Shelbyville, all have admitted recently that new funding is needed. Yet, they have not come to a consensus on how that might be done.
In addition to a gas tax, new fees on electric vehicles and new mileage fees on trucks using state roads are among the ideas that have been bandied about.
Sometimes, though, proving the need for funding is half the battle.
In Hamilton County alone, interchange modifications at the Interstate 24-Interstate 75 split, interchange modifications on I-24 at Market and Broad streets, and the widening of Apison Pike and Bonny Oaks Drive are among the projects in the works that will require state highway dollars.
Tennessee's good roads have always been pay-as-you-go. Whether Haslam proposes a gas tax or some other funding solution, it's important to keep that fiscally responsible method of pay-as-you-go in place.