Commissioner Murman mentioned in this Tampa Tribune article on transportation:

POLITICS

‘Choo choo’ Turanchik seeks to derail ‘dismal’ transportation plan

By Mike Salinero | Tribune Staff

Published: March 4, 2016

Updated: March 5, 2016 at 08:02 AM

TAMPA — Former Hillsborough Commissioner Ed Turanchik was once so smitten with the idea of bringing commuter rail to the county he was dubbed “Commissioner Choo Choo” by a Tampa Tribune columnist.

But for more than a year, Turanchik has quietly worked against a half-cent-per-dollar sales tax referendum that would pay for a commuter rail system connecting downtown Tampa with Tampa International Airport. Turanchik’s opposition to the Go Hillsborough referendum has proponents scratching their heads.

“I understand why conservative Republicans oppose the initiative — because they are philosophically opposed to tax increase,” said Republican Commissioner Ken Hagan, a supporter of the tax referendum. “But Ed is a liberal Democrat who has always been a supporter of mass transit. … I do not understand his opposition.”

Turanchik said he’s not really opposed to a sales tax referendum, but he doesn’t think county voters will support a levy of 30 years when the county’s Go Hillsborough transportation plan only identifies 10 years’ worth of projects.

The prospects for a successful referendum in November are especially dim, Turanchik said, because of the anti-government sentiment pervasive among today’s electorate. He noted that two other transportation tax referendums failed in the Tampa area during the past five years: Greenlight Pinellas in November 2014 and Moving Hillsborough Forward in November 2010.

“I have watched successive referendums run their initiatives right into the minefield,” Turanchik said. “Each referendum we had has had an increasingly dismal result.”

Kevin Thurman, executive director of the pro-transit group Connect Tampa Bay, has criticized Turanchik’s efforts to kill Go Hillsborough. Thurman says Turanchik’s primary motive is advancing a high-speed ferry service for which he is a paid lobbyist.

Thurman points to Turanchik’s support for a 5-cents-per-gallon gas tax increase for transportation projects, a position also favored by the tea party and the Sierra Club. The tea party has consistently opposed any sales tax for transportation.

The Sierra Club doesn’t oppose the sales tax, but said other revenue sources should be employed first, such as the gas tax and mobility fees — payments from developers based on traffic generated by their construction projects. Both groups have enthusiastically endorsed the high speed ferry.

“The truth is he is a lobbyist that continually works with people who are trying to take down Go Hillsborough,” Thurman said.

Turanchik called those charges “silly” and said Thurman is ignoring the major role gas taxes played in building “the greatest transportation system in the world.” Turanchik said gas taxes are a “good user fee.”

“It doesn’t solve everything, but it’s a piece.”

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The transportation initiative now called Go Hillsborough emerged in January 2013 when pro-transit advocates — including Connect Tampa Bay, Sierra Club and Awake Tampa — united to push for mass transit funding. In March of that year, county commissioners agreed to create a task force on transportation that came to be called the Policy Leadership Group.

Thurman said throughout 2013, Turanchik took little part in the group’s process. Then in May 2013, Turanchik rolled out the ferry proposal, which county commissioners initially supported. The following February, the commission appropriated $100,000 for a ferry study.

But the project ran aground in August 2014 when environmentalists criticized Turanchik’s proposal to build the ferry terminal on a conservation preserve. At that point, support from county commissioners seemed to fizzle. They voted to slow the process by expanding the search for possible ferry terminal sites.

In November 2014, Turanchik created Tampa Bay Citizens’ Committee for High Speed Ferries. Ken Roberts, founder of Citizens Organized for Sound Transportation, a tea-party affiliated group, was named co-chairman of the ferry committee. Another co-chairman was Kent Bailey, chairman of the Tampa Bay Group Sierra Club.

By December 2014, Turanchik was energetically pushing for a gas tax. He sent an e-mail that month to County Administrator Mike Merrill with an attached article about falling oil prices. The e-mail’s subject line said, “Time to Bring on the Five Cents Gas Tax Option w/o Referendum!”

Then last June, Turanchik met with tea party members Sharon Calvert and Roberts, and Sierra Club executive committee members Kent Bailey and Pat Kemp. The following month the Sierra Club announced it was backing a 5-cent-per-gallon gas tax.

Calvert said at the time she did not oppose the gas tax because it was a “user fee.” Money from such a tax should go toward road maintenance, Calvert said.

“The only two advocacy groups I’ve seen support the gas tax are Sierra Club and the tea party,” Thurman said. “They were both in that meeting with Ed Turanchik and are both arguing for high speed ferry.”

Bailey said the Sierra Club did not agree to support the ferry because Turanchik was backing a gas tax. Further, he said Turanchik does not attend meetings of the club’s conservation committee, which deals with transportation issues.

“He hasn’t lobbied us that way,” Bailey said.

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In November, the Policy Leadership Group voted 8-3 in favor of the Go Hillsborough transportation plan financed by the half-cent sales tax and mobility fees.

At the same meeting, the group rejected an alternative plan by Republican Commissioner Sandy Murman that featured a 5-cents-per-gallon gas tax and other revenue sources such as dedicating part of the growth in property tax collections each year to a transportation trust fund. The Sierra Club and tea party member Ken Roberts cheered Murman’s proposal. So did Turanchik.

Turanchik also supported another alternative floated two weeks ago by Commissioner Kevin Beckner, a Democrat. Beckner’s plan kept the half-cent sales tax but shortened it to 10 years instead of 30. He also included a gas tax and earmarking new revenue growth for transportation projects.

Tampa officials immediately denounced Beckner’s plan. They said shortening the sales tax to 10 years would kill the city’s plans to build a commuter rail system and expand its street car service. Federal grants that would help pay for the rail system require a longer-term source of revenue to cover operating costs, city leaders said.

Thurman agreed, saying the 30-year tax would give the HART public transit system $900 million over 30 years. In addition to expanding and increasing bus service around the county, some of the money could go to the rail system.

But shortening the tax to 10 years would reduce HART’s share to $294 million, Thurman said.

“I’m saying Ed Turanchik is proposing a $600 million cut in transit from Go Hillsborough,” Thurman said. “Any transit advocate would be against that.”

Turanchik counters that light rail and street car projects are going forward in other Florida cities and counties without sales tax referendums. Those jurisdictions are using state and federal revenue for the majority of capital costs, with local governments paying smaller percentages for operations.

Hillsborough could do the same thing, Turanchik said, with a 10-year sales tax, a gas tax increase, mobility fees and a dedicated portion of sales and revenue taxes.

“Some combination of Murman and Beckner’s plans gives us guaranteed success,” Turanchik said.

County Administrator Mike Merrill disagrees. The gas tax, which commissioners so far have shown no appetite for increasing, provides too little revenue and is unreliable because of shifts in the oil market and a decline in gas consumption as new vehicles get better mileage.

And there are no other sizable revenue sources in the county budget for mass transit, Merrill said. New mobility fees will be county money that can’t be shared with HART or the city of Tampa.

“It’s just that we don’t have that ability; maybe other jurisdictions do,” Merrill said. “But 10 years is not enough to commit to the federal government to get any kind of grant money.”

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