Frederica Freyberg:
In about a month, spring will arrive, the ground will thaw and it will be pothole season. Some roads will be patched, others will be rebuilt. The current state budget calls for the Department of Transportation to spend $3.5 billion maintaining state highways. An additional $840 million will go towards local roads. The consensus among transportation advocates and legislators is that the state is not spending enough on the transportation infrastructure. In 2006 a bipartisan legislative study pegged under-funding at more than $650 million every year. 2006, by the way, was also the year after the legislature ended automatic increases in the gasoline tax. In part one of a series, "Here and Now" producer Art Hackett reports that there's a disconnect in how we pay for the roads that connect us.  

Art Hackett:
The Zoo Interchange on I-94 in Milwaukee is the state's busiest. It's the current poster child for those who say the state’s highway infrastructure and the way we fund it are in a state of decline.

Ryan Luck:
The Zoo Interchange bridges in particular were being inspected annually. We found some advanced deterioration on three bridges in particular.

Art Hackett:
Mid-last year, that triggered an emergency bridge project. The work got underway in January.

Ryan Luck:
It's been determined based on that deterioration that the best way to proceed is to replace them very quickly.

Art Hackett:
Crews are building three new bridges parallel to existing ones at a price tag of $15.3 million. The state's share will be paid from the state transportation fund. That money comes from gasoline taxes, about 31 cents a gallon. Registration fees, currently $75 for each set of license plates. But not tolls. Wisconsin is not Illinois, at least not yet. But back to those new ramps we're paying for. They'll have to be torn down when the entire interchange is rebuilt in the not too distant future.

Jim Sullivan:
I pushed actively to try to have this done in the last budget cycle. The governor had wanted in 2006 to get this thing done. The fiscal crisis being what it is, it didn't get done.

Art Hackett:
Legislators have mixed views on the timing of the fix for the Zoo Interchange. Jim Sullivan of Wauwatosa says it's not fair to blame the temporary fix on the budget situation. Sullivan and the DOT argue the three bridges just wore out before the rest of the interchange.  

Mark Gottlieb:
It's frustrating for me, it should be frustrating for every citizen in the state of Wisconsin. And it is emblematic of our problems in transportation.

Art Hackett:
Rep. Mark Gottlieb says the complete reconstruction of the Zoo Interchange was put off for too long.

Mark Gottlieb:
The Zoo Interchange should have been our number one focus to make sure trucks could move through. That's why we have a problem right now. It's incredibly frustrating. The Zoo is the tip of the iceberg in southeastern Wisconsin.

Art Hackett:
In 2006, Gottlieb co-chaired a joint committee on state transportation financing. It was known informally as the Road to the Future committee. What they found was the growing shortfall in Wisconsin's ability to pave that road.

Mark Gottlieb:
We looked at four areas, financing of state highways. We looked at local aids. We looked at transit. And the findings were that we were significantly under-funding all those areas.

Art Hackett:
Gottlieb says the shortfall in 2006 was over $500 million per year. A follow-up calculation in 2008 raised the figure to $700 million. This revenue stream is dwindling as cars become more fuel efficient. That's driven up the shortfall since the gas tax supplies 57 percent of state transportation funding.

John Townsend:
What we're really seeing is that on miles driven, the cost, I shouldn't say cost, but the revenue we're collecting is declining. So it's not growing in relationship to the growth of the economy.

Art Hackett:
It wasn't always this way. From 1983 to 2005 the state indexed the gas tax to hold revenues in line with number of gallons of gas consumed.

John Townsend:
The Legislature decided that increase in taxes should be something that the Legislature should vote on. So we abolished indexing. So we don't see that automatic increase.

Art Hackett:
When they voted to end indexing, did you vote to end it?  

John Townsend:
I probably did.

Art Hackett:
The official roll call shows Townsend definitely did vote to end indexing.  

Frederica Freyberg:
Next week, Art will explore some ways out of this mess and you'll hear from those who aren't sure there's a mess to begin with.