COUNTYWIDE : Sales Tax Urged to Fund Road Projects

The chairman of the California Transportation Commission said Wednesday that without a sales-tax measure to supplement Ventura County’s transportation funds, major county projects will be delayed for years while traffic conditions worsen.

“It’s easy to see the problems coming,” said Bruce Nestande, chairman of the eight-member advisory commission that is meeting in Ventura this week. The commission is responsible for allocating funds statewide for transportation projects.

Nestande and other members of the commission were given a helicopter tour Wednesday by Ventura County transportation officials to get a firsthand look at traffic conditions on the county’s roadways.

Nestande said most of the congestion that he observed was along the Ventura and Moorpark freeways in the east county.

Despite what he saw, Nestande said traffic in the county is still manageable. But he said the county must pass a sales tax measure to ensure that it receives all the funds available to it under Proposition 111.

In November, Ventura County voters overwhelmingly rejected a half-cent sales tax that would have generated more than $500 million for transportation projects over the next 20 years.

“There is no funding alternative,” Nestande said of the sales-tax measure. “The dollars are just not there. They’re not in the state system. They’re not in the federal system. Without the sales tax, you are just going to have severe congestion.”

Ginger Gherardi, executive director of the Ventura County Transportation Commission, agreed with Nestande’s assessment.

She said there are plans to put another sales-tax measure on the ballot, possibly by next year.

“We have an opportunity to prevent the kinds of problems there are in Orange County and in Los Angeles County. If we don’t act in a reasonable time frame, that opportunity is going to be gone,” she said.