_Note: this story is the second in a two-part series about RTA Next. To read the first part, focused on public transit, please click here._
Voters have until March 10 to cast ballots in an election that could heavily influence the future of transportation in Pima County.
RTA Next, a $2.67 billion spending plan for local roads, public transit and pedestrian upgrades, is on the ballot as Propositions 418 and 419. It asks voters to maintain a 0.5% sales tax in Pima County that was first approved in 2006 with the creation of the Regional Transportation Authority.
With the tax expiring later this year, RTA Next would extend it for another 20 years to keep much of the region’s public transit network in operation and fund a wide range of road improvement projects.
About two thirds of RTA Next’s total spending is devoted to roads. Over $1.1 billion is slated for new road projects. About $260 million would go towards finishing incomplete road projects from the first RTA plan. About $250 million is set aside for pedestrian, bicycle and disability-friendly improvements, while almost $180 million will pay for repaving some roads, primarily in the City of Tucson, according to the RTA Next plan document.
The plan’s proponents argue its projects are important for growth in Pima County and that the RTA will not repeat mistakes that led to several incomplete projects. Opponents distrust the RTA because of those delays and say the plan spends too much money on expanding roads in wealthier areas.
The ballot measure is split into two propositions because one would approve the spending plan and the other would approve the sales tax. Both must pass for the plan to take effect.
A regional plan attracts more state money, helps metro area compete with other cities for investment, backers say##
New road projects in RTA Next run a wide gamut. The plan would invest in growing suburban areas, funding new highway interchanges in Marana and Sahuarita while widening roads in Vail. In Tucson’s inner city, it would rebuild most of Prince Road and Drexel Road with sidewalks, bike lanes and new crossings. It would widen several roads in Oro Valley and Drexel Heights while funding planning and land purchases for the Sonoran Corridor, a proposed highway connecting Sahuarita to Interstate 10 south of Tucson International Airport.
Hypothetically, individual cities and towns could fund the projects through their own sales taxes or bond issues. But it’s unclear if every municipality in Pima County would do so if RTA Next fails.
Writing to AZPM, many Tucson City Council members expressed skepticism about voters’ enthusiasm for a city-specific sales tax if they reject RTA Next. Speaking to reporters this week, Tucson Mayor Regina Romero said it could take a year or more to put together such a proposal. On the other hand, she said RTA Next succeeding could be a sign to start pursuing a Tucson-specific, transit and pedestrian-focused proposition on top of the regional tax.
“We do this now, we do 418 and 419, and we continue asking the voters of Tucson how they want to invest in ourselves,” she said. “It’s not one or the other.”
Marana Town Manager Terry Rozema said it’s not yet been decided if the city would implement its own sales taxes if the ballot measure fails. Meanwhile, two local mayors — in Oro Valley and Sahuarita — told AZPM they would attempt to.
But even with a city-specific sales tax, the RTA offers a crucial advantage, according to Sahuarita Mayor Tom Murphy. Without the measure’s legally binding 20-year project list, it would be more difficult for local projects to receive funding from the Arizona Department of Transportation.
“We might be able to get it, we would be able to compete for it, but my feeling is it wouldn’t be as solid, protected as it would be if RTA Next passes,” he said.
According to RTA Board Member Ted Maxwell, who is a state appointee to the board, the highway interchanges in RTA Next will receive significant state funding if the plan is approved. He said that when ADOT is assured that local governments are pitching in to highway projects, the state agency writes the projects into its five-year plans.
Murphy argued that investing in growing suburbs is beneficial for metro Tucson as a whole.
“When we’re competing against Denver, or El Paso, or Salt Lake (City), or Phoenix, or Goodyear or any of those communities up in Maricopa, if we don’t have a transportation plan regionally, and working together, why would these major industries, if they have other choices, even look to invest in us?” he asked.
In total, RTA Next highway interchanges would receive $110 million in RTA Next funding and $655 million in ADOT funding, according to the plan document.
Unfinished projects have eroded trust towards RTA, but officials say mistakes will not be repeated##
In the daily lives of Pima County residents, the RTA has sometimes made itself known through inconvenient construction projects that are not finished on time.
This week, traffic crawled past orange cones, excavators and mounds of dirt at Grant Road and Alvernon Way in Tucson. People shopping at a nearby Walmart expressed frustration about the project.
“I’m not a very patient person, but it seems to be just continually on and on and on,” said Laura Beaumont.
Lonnie Campbell, an employee at the store, said the construction has affected shoppers' behavior.
“There’s a lot of anger out here every day. I see people yelling at each other, I see people upset,” he said.
The modernization of Grant Road is one of seven unfinished projects from the original RTA that have been moved to RTA Next. The others include Tucson’s 22nd Street bridge, widening stretches of Houghton Road and Silverbell Road, and rebuilding parts of First Avenue with bike lanes and sidewalks.
At a [televised AZPM panel event](
Maxwell said the original plan was based on overly optimistic projections for sales tax revenue that were dashed by the Great Recession and the COVID-19 pandemic and left some projects without funding. RTA Next, he said, is based on more conservative projections that make it less likely the authority will run out of money.
The Pima County Republican Party is encouraging voters to reject propositions 418 and 419, citing unfinished projects.
“The new plan demands over $260 million just to finish what was already promised — meaning we're being asked to bail out past failures,” wrote Janet Wittenbraker, a former Republican candidate for Mayor of Tucson, on the party’s website.
Opponents say plan spends too much on wealthy areas, doesn’t reflect best planning practices##
Other critics of the plan — particularly transit advocates in the City of Tucson — say it is unfair for taxpayers in the county’s largest city to subsidize expensive projects in wealthier suburbs.
“If you look at the projects in Oro Valley, if you look at the projects in Marana, I’m not going to say they don’t need these things, but they don’t need us to pay for them,” said Arlie Adkins, a professor of urban planning at the University of Arizona, at an anti-RTA Next panel hosted by the Living Streets Alliance, an advocacy group.
Oro Valley and Marana both have median household incomes above $100,000, while Tucson’s is under $55,000, according to the UA’s Eller School of Management. But as Pima County’s largest city, Tucson generates most RTA sales tax revenue, the Tucson Sentinel reported.
RTA Next does include a significant new project aimed at Tucson: almost $180 million for repaving arterial and collector streets, less intensive than RTA’s usual full-scale street reconstructions. State statutes do not allow the RTA to conduct routine road maintenance, but the plan’s backers say the repaving can improve some of the bumpiest local roads.
Arterial streets are those that cut through the whole city, while collector streets are the main feeders for them. Tucson has 1,665 lane miles of arterial and collector streets, according to a city memo.
According to data provided to AZPM by Tucson’s Department of Transportation and Mobility, the funds in RTA Next would allow the city to repave 1,790,386 square yards of road. Based on Tucson’s required lane width of four feet for busy roads, that funding would allow for repaving about 15% of the city’s arterial and collector streets, measured in miles of travel lanes.
According to a draft memo obtained by AZPM, Tucson is considering repaving large stretches of Campbell Avenue, Irvington Road and Broadway Boulevard if the funding is approved.
Adkins also said RTA Next does not follow best practices in planning: outlining shared community values, identifying ways to get there and using those metrics to justify projects.
“The plan, to me, reads a little bit like a grab-bag of jurisdictional wishes,” he said in an interview. “Which makes sense, because that’s how the process was set up.”
Critics of RTA Next point to its board’s composition, where the mayors of smaller communities like Sahuarita and Oro Valley have the same voting power as the City of Tucson. They say this disadvantages public transit funding in favor of suburban road projects.
Tucson officials previously opposed extending the RTA’s sales tax due to these reasons. Last year, however, former Tucson city manager Mike Ortega became the RTA’s director after former director Farhad Moghimi’s firing. All Tucson City Council members but one now support the plan, which funds many projects in Tucson, especially on its south side. One of them, according to Ward 5 council member Selina Barajas, has been a community wish for a long time: a pedestrian bridge over the Santa Cruz River at Drexel Road.
“They would ask me, is this really gonna happen? Because it’s been in the works for years, beyond my lifetime here on Earth,” she said at a January city council meeting.
Pima County encourages voters to mail their ballots in the election for Propositions 418 and 419 by March 3, but will also have several in-person dropoff sites available on March 10.
