Voter's Pipeline; Adriana Gianturco

Now that's become part of the life of Orange County people. That problem is now among the top most watched a continuation of a decent quality of life for people in business and industries in the future. To talk with me about a problem is the most. Director of planning for the state of Massachusetts as an economist and as a reporter for Time magazine she holds an M.A. degree in economics from UC Berkeley. Turkle has been a controversial figure almost from her first days of office. She's battled with conviction for her concerns about mass transit the environment and more recently in defense of Amtrak. But her critics say that she has neglected freeway and road construction

in this state. A Senate finance subcommittee had deleted her salary from the state transportation budget in the expression of its disapproval of Michigan Turkle and she's now paid from other state funds at the present time a bill is been introduced to require a licensed engineer for her job. This is also seen as an action against those policies. So I think I'd like to ask you about your critics and you've never been apparently short on critics since you've been there. You have strong supporters and strong critics. What about the. Antipathy of some of the people in the Senate Finance Committee and some of the people in the Assembly Transportation Committee people that are opposed to your policy. Well I think actually now the Assembly Transportation Committee is pretty much proceeding along the same wavelength that we've been talking about for the last five years so there is no great conflict there but there certainly are some conflicts with some legislators. I think the unfortunate part about it is that I don't think it's very productive in public policy to attack individuals. If

there are policy differences we should be talking about those policies and not personalizing things. Do you see this latest move to require an engineer for your job is something directed more against you than about policy. Well I would just comment that in they something like 80 years that our organization has been in existence. There has never been a civil engineer. Running the organisation it is not an engineering job. It's like saying that a legislator would have to be a lawyer or a hospital administrator to be a doctor. It's a management job. My job is to direct people allocate resources deal with communities formulate policy and so on and I couldn't possibly or any other individual have the time to do engineering work designing roads measuring thicknesses of pavement and so on. We have 5000 highly competent engineers in the department that do that and that's not what my job is. Some of your critics say that you are just a pipeline for the

gov to execute all of his policies all of his philosophy. Could you make it clear just how you would answer that. No I think it's a more complex relationship. I'm not a robot nor is any department head of department heads are expected to make recommendations to make a lot of decisions themselves because the governor doesn't have time to deal with every issue that is coming up in every area. On the other hand there is I certainly get feedback if the governor thinks that I'm not going in the right direction and there we have debate and dialogue and ultimately he's the final decision maker but it's not a simple thing where he's on the phone to me every day and says this is what I want you to do for the next eight hours. Do this do that. Obviously a lot of responsibility is delegated to me. You do have some offical differences with him from time to time. Oh we've had a lot of discussions I think that basically we're coming from the same place which is that we need to live within the resources that we have

as much as possible try to make the most cost effective use of taxpayers funds. I create a balance transportation system in this state which is a legislative mandate for our department specifically to try to be concerned about the various segments of the population who have to move around not just people who own cars and can drive them but also the elderly and the handicapped and to be concerned about the issues that are related to transportation such as air pollution and energy consumption and affects on communities of building highways and so on. It seems in discussing this. I'm aware of your concerns about energy environment and economics to long range. The long view if you will but it seems also a big important part of your job is the now dealing with the now the horrible horrendous transportation problem that exist particularly in Southern California. I'd like to talk first about money because money is so much a part of what what is in the

realm of the possible. It's in seemed to be an incredible variation between the estimates of one hundred fifteen million dollar deficit that you could have at the end of five years on this next project. To some estimates go as high as 2.4 million deficit. If nothing new happens you want to comment on that let's talk about the money because money is such a big part of the solution. Deficits are not deficits in the sense that we have binding commitments contracts that we've entered into that we cannot pay off the disc or it's really a discrepancy between the funds available and what people want us to do. If people want us to do three times as much as we're doing now then the deficit would probably be three or four billion. If they want to do a hundred times more the deficit could be a trillion. That's a question of bringing spending in line with resources and there are two ways to approach that obviously one is to cut back on planned spending. And the other thing is to raise

revenues which means raising taxes so that you can carry at a higher level of program. The 900 15 million dollar figure that we have used represents the difference between a five year plan for highway construction that was developed last year and what it would cost to carry out that plan. The figures of several billions of dollars to the tune of how it is in the even that are being. Put forth by other parties were represent either increases in the plan which obviously would make it cost more and there would then be a greater discrepancy between that and what we have or assumptions that are made about the rate of inflation which is a very important factor in all of us. If inflation continues to occur at the rate that is it has been occurring for the last few years then we will clearly not be able to build what we had planned even if we got nine hundred fifteen million dollars more. On the other hand it is my hope that President Reagan in fact will be successful in bringing inflation rates down. In which

case if he goes as far as he hopes to go we may have no deficit or discrepancy at all. Of course that could have good news and bad news the good news being that it brings inflation under control but the bad news being that a lot of programs federal monies which would pour into state projects that a highway project would be cut off. These things that are all interconnected. If one of the ways of treating inflation is to cut government spending then you can't boost government spending and hope to control inflation of course there are other factors at work in inflation besides government spending. One of the principal factors has been the increase in the price of energy which has had very very direct impacts on our programs not only in terms of the kinds of travel behavior that people are exhibiting now more carpooling more use of transit less driving but also in terms of the costs that we ourselves have faced when we build something. Because highway construction is a very and energy

intensive form of construction. It doesn't use very much labor it's not like building a house. You use a lot of oil goes laying equipment plus we use. Various products that are petroleum based on the best example there is asphalt which is a derivative of petroleum. So if the price of oil doubles or triples it will have a much greater effect on our costs than it costs on the economy in general. One of the remedies for this money crunch that we were just talking about is SB 215 the friend billed by Senator friend to increase two cents by 2 cents the gas tax and other fees such as the driver's license fees and motor vehicle registration fees and the other bill would be the impact Assemblyman Bill and I know that you've spoken about them a lot of people probably are looking to you or to the governor for some guidance or some leadership on that. What is your posture on whether the bill should or should not pass to address the problem. The serious

need for more study time and money. Well I don't have a posture independent from that of the governor. The one thing that we do in state government it's done the same in the same way at the federal level as department heads are out there independently advocating a position it is the chief executive who will take the position what is and as of as of this moment we do not have an approved position on either one of those bills. I think they raise a number of very serious issues. The finance bill obviously is a tax increase. The people of this state have been most reluctant to have their taxes raised recently as a matter of fact the trend has been in the opposite direction as to the fee increases. There is a separate logic behind those which I think makes them perhaps more compelling and that is that driver's license is now the fee that you pay for a license does not cover the cost of processing that license. Registration fees which go to support not only the operations of our

department to a certain extent but also more importantly the operations of the highway patrol are not adequate to support the highway patrol to the extent that most people think it ought to be operating and truck weight fees which are the final component. I think on the merits clearly should be increased regardless of whether or not we want to build more highways and the reason for that is that trucks cause very extensive damage to roads and in addition to that we have to build roads to a much higher standard. And initially making the more expensive sturdier bridges wider curves on ramps and so on to accommodate these kinds of vehicles. And consequently they should be paying more towards the total moneys that are ways than they now pay. But I think these are pretty complex issues there is also the issue of whether if there were to be a tax increase it should be imposed at the state level or should be done under some kind of vote of the people. And then theres a separate issue as to whether. There should be a

step to state tax increase that provides for a local road improvements or whether that ought to be done at a local option. I know that the taxpayers in one part of the state are not subsidizing the taxpayers in another part of the state are benefiting from. One of the maddening things about the tax collector now is that we have a tax on a tax you know and because of the increase in the price of a gallon of gas the sales tax component of that of buying a gallon of gas is quite large now is it something like six hundred seven hundred million dollars a year and in the sales taxes that are generated from gasoline. Do you have any position on whether that money should all be diverted to transportation use instead of going into the general fund. Well let me say that I don't agree that that's maddening. I don't see why gasoline should be exempted from the sales tax any more than clothing. You buy a car you buy a boat you buy anything with the exception of food or drugs you think that an attack on attack the way it's calculated or the way it's calculated should probably be changed so that the

sales tax is imposed on gasoline per say higher to the flat tax being unpleasant cents for the Adams. But the concept of a sales tax on gasoline I find perfectly proper and not at all inconsistent with what we're doing in other areas let me say that when that tax was put into effect it was imposed specifically for the purposes of raising funds for transit not transportation in general but transit. And what happened was that by a fluke of the legislative process having to do with the timing of the passage of two separate bills that were going through a discrepancy developed between the funds that were raised and the funds that were funneled into transit and the differences than going into the general fund. My own personal inclination on this although they have 150 million a year going into the general Yes well of course it is supporting services that people apparently think are worthwhile services in the general fund pays for crime

protection that pays for education it pays for all the various services but that money of course is excluded from your use. I say you use the Department of Transportation's use for the money that's going to the general fund is not going for transit. You know that's true. You don't have a need to depart and one thing that that the current proposals are to take it out of the general beyond and devote it to highways. Now I want to find would do that one of the way and the other is a quick way you would do it immediately and then my my preference would be to return that money to what it was originally intended to go for and that is transit. It was never intended to go to highways it was intended to go to transit in fact it is a rapid transit mass transit busses it could be anything it does or vanpool it might it will be addressing the transportation albums of the state yes. But I would have to say there is an argument on the other side. It's not that doesn't happen to be my position because I'm in the transportation area but as a part of the administration that if those funds work taken out of the general fund it means that other programs

would have to be cut. You don't have any official department Caltrans policy then about the sales tax where we it was opposed in the past on several occasions that the monies be taken out of the general fund and put back in transit. But these proposals have never gotten through and now the move is to take it out of the general fund and put it in highways. Most people who are inching down the freeway at 5 o'clock at night and wondering why they want to going 10 miles an hour don't know what a step is a step is a funny word to them it's an acronym that means state transportation improvement plan. And I'm talking specifically about the need to plan for the next five years. What has angered many Orange County officials is not so much what was left in as what was screened out of the five year plan. The screened out was improvement of I-5. He claims improvement of Route 55 8 lanes the I-5 Route 5 interchange meaning that the interchange between the two freeways at the San Joaquin corridor of the coast a maze of ditch and extending Corona del Mar freeway 73.

These are things which the Orange County Transportation Commission officials felt were critically needed and they were screened out. They're angry about that and I think it's fair to ask you to respond to that. Well when you say they were screened out the implication is that they were in the program at some point in time and were moved in that is not the case. I don't think there's anything different in Orange County from any other county in the state everybody thinks they ought to be getting a larger share of the pie the pie is just so big friend 7 had asked for about this is that where you're confusing Another is you want to be a need study and there are two separate things to talk about the stip first and then I'll talk about the need to study the stiff as a five year program of projects and when we've talked about the 900 15 million dollar haul possibly great greater deficit in whatever that refers to the difference between the stip planned projects and likely available revenues over the next five years the need study is a separate thing and the need to study

is a part of the process whereby we allocate funds to different geographic areas within the state in coming up with a step. And it's part of. A process which is very cumbersome and very complex it's very difficult for anybody to understand it as a matter of fact it is so complicated that in order to apply it within Caltrans we literally have to have computer programs that will spin out numbers for us because there are so many factors that you have to take into account but in any event you try to simplify it with the need of the ball and you say the dummy as if that were they were screened out this is a state wide study that is done once every four years. The intent of it is to include using the same criteria projects that meet those criteria statewide. And if you change the criteria so that you can include more projects of the specific type in one area say are Orange County you probably would be a wash because they would be similar

projects in some other area. That would then qualify. And the ultimate effect of this is it's done on a proportional basis so it doesn't create more money to include more needs in Orange County it would just jack up the needs in some other area and probably Orange County would end up the same in terms of the specific controversy that's gone on here about the need study. People have not been satisfied with the percent share of total needs that Orange County ended up with when we applied these statewide criteria. And basically they have been urging us to change the criteria. We simply cannot do that. First of all it would take another probably 18 months of going through it but secondly the likelihood is that in if anything Orange County might lose because if we were to add the uncertain projects in Orange County changing the criteria would have to do the same in L.A. County and Shasta County in San Diego County Trinity County you name it we have 58 counties that are involved.

Let's just take one area I'm sure you heard the hourglass argument of the Santa Ana Freeway I-5 which has includes half the state's population between L.A. County Orange County and San Diego County. And the hourglass is Orange County if you say that most of I-5 in San Diego is. An eight lane freeway and most of all the I-5 in L.A. County is an eight lane freeway. Then you come to this little pinched hourglass of Orange County being a six lane freeway. So if you just take that one that one project I would like to ask you about your own policy which is this is from your policy direction statement where you say maintenance rehabilitation and reconstruction of existing systems have top priority and will continue to have first call on funds. Now if that's true and what they have asked from Orange County is capacity increase understanding on a freeway corridor I-5 and capacity increase in Costa Mesa freeway

as our 55 but let's just keep it I think it would take it would definitely be a lower priority and let me so that when you ration based on your on your own priority then that should be at the top of the list is that correct maintenance and rehabilitation of the existing system. Yes but that means the existing system as that is on the ground our top priority is to make I-5. I 5s I would take the San Diego Freeway 4 0 5 take 80 freeway. Our first priority is to make sure that those the soul of these do not deteriorate in their current configuration. We don't want to see potholes in the roads. We don't want to see bridges collapsing we've put a tremendous investment into these existing facilities and I think and I think there is general agreement in the legislature on this point that our obligation to the taxpayers is to protect that existing investment and it is only when we have successfully done that that we would use any funds that remain to do new construction such as widening freeways and let me point out that widening freeways is not cheap.

I mean really it is and to widen the Santa Ana Freeway it would cost about ten million dollars a mile and you widen it for a substantial distance. You're talking about a hundred two hundred million dollars. Is it likely then that given the fact that the hourglass configuration does exist eight lanes to the south eight lanes to the north and you can down into Orange County with only six lanes that at least it should be a high priority if not in this state. Need study than should be the employer let me put it this way the need to study the problem is certainly a a real problem and one that should be dealt with. I don't think that the solution is as evident is as you may make be making it out to be. There are a number of ways of handling freeways that are operating over capacity. The cheapest way to handle it is to encourage people to form carpools or van pools. We did a study in the Los Angeles County and we also included Orange County as a matter of fact areas about three years ago in which we

calculated what it would cost. And again this is taxpayers money it's not free to increase the capacity on the entire freeway system such that we would have free front flow traffic at peak hours meaning 55 miles an hour. Well as I recall the cost of that it was like four billion dollars and this was three years ago. That's probably up to seven or eight billion dollars. Another way to approach that problem in the hourglass problem is right where you have congestion and congestion in the city. Yeah I was not only Orange County there are freeways in L.A. that have the same situation oh yeah where they lanes drop off or whatever. There's another approach to the problem which would say that if we could simply increase the average rate of carpooling and average vehicle occupancy now is about 1 person per car. I think overall it amounts to one point one person per car. If we could raise that to one point three persons per car which would say that most people were still driving alone but every second or third driver was sharing a ride with somebody else

congestion would disappear overnight at no cost would be found we would also save the commuter a lot of money. Agreeing that mass transit Amtrak and other things I want to talk about Amtrak agreeing that all the other alternatives are important. Is it accurate to say than the counter-trend is entertaining the idea. Why do 95 through Orange County. Oh yes as a matter of fact we have even if they did not in the study we well there is a study going under on right now which is being from the last study. Not to my knowledge there is another study and there are lots of different processes and studies that we go through there is not one single process where all the answers come out. There is a carter study going on right now for the Santa Ana corridor when just looking at solutions to the congestion problem in that corridor we are a participant in that process and I believe they have come up with several possibilities and one is widening. But they're also looking at the possibility of providing a transit line in that corridor. Making certain other improvements to roads ramp metering this kind of thing so I think there are a number of

options here and our job when I see my job anyway in government is to try to come up with the one that makes makes the most sense. Cost the least and gets the most benefits. Let's talk about one of the options that you feel strongly about Amtrak. What do you see happening in Amtrak as it affects Southern California. Well we're very worried about the proposals being made by the Reagan administration to cut the Amtrak budget by 30 percent which is a very hefty cut if those proposals were to go forward. What we hear from Amtrak itself is that all train service outside of the northeast corridor. And that would of course include California we're not in the Northeast Corridor would be eliminated and this would have a very dramatic effect in California. We have some of the most heavily patronised trains in the entire United States running here including the train from Los Angeles to San Diego the train that goes along the coast which ends up in Seattle the San Francisco Zephyr which was the original transcontinental

passenger train all these trains would go. It seems to me that this is a rather short sighted approach to be taking to transportation given the fact that Amtrak ridership has been zooming in the last few years. At the same time that automobile travel has been going down as a direct reflection of rises in the price of fuel. And I don't see that turning around in the future. What do you see as your projection. The Amtrak stops that you've mentioned multiple stops in Orange County for example Mission Viejo and places like that. Well we have an Juan Capistrano all those stops and we have been conducting a feasibility study which is the first stage to actually implementing any new service that has been going on for I guess about a year it's involved a lot of technical work. It's now in its final draft stages I would say because we have not taken it to the concerned communities and we will do that before we make any final decisions but currently our thinking is that there should be a commuter rail service

added on the route with multiple stops. Now you're encouraged about it. I think it has great potential. And then those are going to happen along of them enjoyed talking to you and you're chatting with us about a very hot subject transportation advantage in Turkle Caltrans director. Please join us next week at this time and I'll be interviewing all forewarn County congressman and Washington DC about the very hot fight going on about the proposed tax cuts of the Reagan administration. I'm Jim Cooper. Thanks for being with us. The.