(The following story by Phil Pitchford appeared on The Press-Enterprise website on November 2.)
RIVERSIDE, Calif. — After years of watching much bigger counties grab the bulk of state transportation funds, Inland officials have formed a partnership with their former competitors in the hopes of beating San Diego County and Northern California to hundreds of millions of dollars.
Riverside and San Bernardino counties hope that a five-county approach with Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties will persuade the state to distribute much of the $2 billion in upcoming state transportation bonds to the parts of Southern California that deal most with the transport of imported goods from Asia.
“If we don’t do this together through coalition warfare, we’re not going to get our fair share,” said Assemblyman Paul Cook, R-Yucca Valley.
Coastal counties see the Inland area as an ally in spurring the investment of as much as $1.75 billion in Alameda Corridor East, the highways and rail lines that move billions of dollars worth of goods from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach out of Southern California and on to the rest of the country.
Other areas eligible for the trade corridor improvement funds include the Bay Area, the San Joaquin Valley and the border area of San Diego County. Needs statewide far outstrip even the $2 billion available so competition is fierce.
Regional Approach
The 12-member Southern California Working Group, made up of the five counties and various transportation agencies that serve them, has mounted a combined effort to build support for their ideas with state agencies and elected officials. The agencies also have combined their planning and strategy efforts.
The key, they say, is setting aside past rivalries and bruised feelings. Riverside and Orange counties have fought over the 91 Express Lanes, for example, but both now are dealing with the congestion and pollution caused by growing rail traffic.
“Floridians fight for Florida, and Texans fight for Texas,” San Bernardino County Supervisor Dennis Hansberger said. “Californians fight each other, and that has to stop.”
Even if money is set aside for local projects, much work would remain. The Legislature must put the funds into the state budget, and the $2 billion is likely to be spread out over a few years, legislators said.
Voters created a modern-day gold rush last year when they approved Prop. 1B, the $19.9 billion transportation bond.
The most logical use for the $2 billion in this round of funding, local officials say, is to deal with the effects of millions of metal containers full of products made overseas being unloaded at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, then moved by truck and train through Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
The two ports now handle about 15 million 20-foot containers of products each year, an amount that is expected to triple by 2020.
“Our region can barely handle the ports today, let alone their exponential growth,” said Anne Mayer, executive director of the Riverside County Transportation Commission.
85 Percent of $2 Billion
Some of that international trade — 30 percent to 40 percent, according to estimates — is bound for Inland distribution centers, which creates jobs. But the rest rolls right through to the rest of the country, fouling the air with diesel exhaust and stranding motorists at railroad crossings. Consequently, the working group wants the state to spend more than 85 percent of the trade corridor money, or $1.75 billion, in the five counties.
That is a major shift from the historical split of state transportation funds, which usually falls along a 60 / 40 division, with the larger amount staying in Southern California. Inland officials are pushing for that money and, along the way, reassuring doubters that their multiple-county approach actually will work.
“You can’t blame people for being skeptical about whether it (the coalition) will stay together,” said Deborah Barmack, executive director of San Bernardino’s transportation-planning agency, the San Bernardino Associated Governments. “But that commitment is very real.”
Art Leahy, executive director of the Orange County Transportation Authority, said cooperation with the Inland area has increased greatly in recent years.
“We’ve come to see that we have more in common than we do in conflict,” Leahy said. “We all get stopped by freight trains, and we all have to share the freeways with these trucks. We have a powerful common interest.”
‘We Would Get Walked Over’
Skeptics include Riverside Councilman Steve Adams, who called the funding process “frightening for this area.” He said much of the money appears to be headed for the ports and the two railroads that transport freight, not to highways and railroad crossings.
“It still looks like we would get walked over by LA and Orange counties, as well as Northern California,” he said.
It also is unclear exactly how the selection process will work. Dale Bonner, the state’s secretary of business, transportation and housing, has urged the California Transportation Commission to adopt a list of projects by Dec. 31. Some progress could come next week at a two-day commission meeting in La Quinta.
But the Legislature would still have final say. In the first round of Prop. 1B funding earlier this year, some Los Angeles County legislators threatened to hold up funding if their projects were not chosen. The situation eventually was resolved.
Differing Priorities
Even within the Inland area, there remain differing priorities. Riverside County is aggressively pursuing money for a series of railroad underpasses and overpasses, including several in Riverside. San Bernardino County wants money to expand the Interstate 15 / 215 interchange in Devore, as well as for rail crossings and interchange improvements on Interstate 10.
San Diego County wants to devote about $75 million in trade-corridor bond money to a new $500 million crossing at the United States/Mexico border.
Inland officials say state bond funds should not be spent on what they see as a federal issue, but Jack Boda, mobility director for the San Diego Association of Governments, said the economic effect of products trucked into California from Mexico justifies the investment.
More than 60 percent of the goods brought into the country by ship at the Los Angeles County ports ends up somewhere else in the country, Boda said. But about 80 percent of the goods trucked in from Mexico benefit California, he said.
Railroads Favor Funding
Railroads also are pushing for state funding, including at the Colton Crossing, the spot just south of Interstate 10 where major rail lines operated by Union Pacific and the BNSF Railway cross at a 90-degree angle, causing serious delays.
Public officials say railroads should bear the brunt of fixing the Colton Crossing because a solution would benefit their operations and profitability.
“Public funds should pay for public benefits,” San Bernardino County Supervisor Gary Ovitt said.