After the failure of Measure A transportation sales tax measure, everyone who was for it, and everyone who was against it, asked ‘What’s next?’ It is clear there is a need to fund at least some types of transportation infrastructure, including transit, active transportation, and repairing the potholes. It is also clear to me, at least, there there is absolutely no need to fund roadway capacity expansion. We have all of the roadways we will ever need – we need less capacity, not more. But that is not clear to everyone. A lot of people initially were saying things like “we just need to improve the measure a bit, perhaps by removing the Capital Southeast Connector, and then it will pass in 2024. Fortunately, that view has faded. We need something much better than the failed Measure A, and it is not obvious that more transportation sales tax is the right solution. So, What’s next?

One of the groups working on that question is the Mayor’s Environmental Advocacy Roundtable (the mayor being Mayor Darrell Steinberg). A premise of the group is that there might be a role for the city in defining how to fund transportation, and perhaps creating a sales tax or other measure focused on the city. This group has met four times. I was able to attend the last meeting on March 22, and have a brief report. Please keep in mind that these are my notes about what I found interesting, not minutes of the meeting. First, two documents were available, shared here, the agenda, and the overview. Jennifer Donlon Wyant gave a presentation on the city’s transportation planning and funding, which I do not have available. The remainder of the meeting was discussion. So, my notes:

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