Metro officials, transit agencies warn of big setbacks under GOP transportation plan

Metropolitan Transit officials and advocates voiced their opposition on Wednesday to the day-old House Republican transportation plan, warning it would force deep cuts in Metropolitan Council bus service and unfairly restrict local officials from transit planning.

Rolled out Tuesday, the House GOP plan would use borrowing and a shift of transportation-related revenues from the General Fund to infuse $2 billion into the state’s road construction budget over the next two years, and roughly $6 billion over the next decade.

In a bill heavily focused on roads and bridges, suburban and Greater Minnesota transit would also see a bump in funding under HF861, sponsored by Rep. Paul Torkelson (R-Hanska). But the Metropolitan Council, which operates Metro Transit, would be hit with a roughly $53 million decrease in transportation funding.

That would mean big reductions in local route bus service, said Metropolitan Council Government Affairs Director Judd Schetnan, with impacts felt throughout the Twin Cities’ transit system.

“This bill … it leaves the Metropolitan Council, metropolitan area transit with a $55 million deficit” for operations in 2018-19, he told the House Transportation Finance Committee.

Schetnan was among those to criticize the proposal during hours of testimony. The bill also received positive feedback from advocates and local officials thankful for the promise of more road funding and Trunk Highway bonding, as well as those critical of light-rail projects that would be severely curbed under policy provisions included in the bill.

READ MORE House GOP lays out $6 billion plan for road, bridge construction

Scott Peterson, MnDOT’s director of government affairs, echoed a letter from Transportation Commissioner Charlie Zelle in applauding the bill’s recognition of the need for more dollars for road and bridge projects across the state.

But he also said the department is concerned with paying for that funding boost out of the General Fund, a point Torkelson has rebutted by noting a number of other states fund transportation in the same way.

Other key areas of the bill propose to prevent municipalities, counties and regional rail authorities in the Twin Cities metropolitan area from spending funds on planning, project development or construction of any light-rail line without explicit Legislative approval.

It would also require a metro-area transit funding board, the Counties Transit Improvement Board, to fund 100 percent of the operating and maintenance costs of Metropolitan Council-operated transitways.

Hennepin County Commissioner Peter McLaughlin criticized those measures as “interference with the actions of local elected officials” and said the bill would harm “the economic engine of the state.” 

“It’s a case of, ‘Mother may I?’” McLaughlin said. Local officials will have to ask, “’Can we do this?’” but then be told “you’ve got to pay for it.”