News Articles

Charlie Whitehead

Naples Daily News

February 12, 2008 - FORT MYERS - Rep. Connie Mack told Lee County commissioners Monday he’s still dead-set against tolling Interstate 75.

Mack said that tolling seems like the easy out, but it’s a tax that motorists pay, and will pay forever.

“Tolls never go away,” Mack said in a meeting with commissioners. “They’re an added tax. The easy thing to do is say ‘Let’s toll.”

When he was pushing hard for I-75 funding in Washington there was never a mention of tolling, Mack said. It’s a question of credibility.

“There’s no way I can support the idea and say to the people of Southwest Florida ‘Thank you, now we’re going to toll you.’”

The Southwest Florida Expressway Authority is looking at tolling new lanes on I-75 to generate revenue to further widen the highway. The original plan, when the Legislature created the authority in 2005, was to toll lanes seven through 10 and use the proceeds to pay for the work.

Consultants have agreed, however, that the scheme won’t work. Only by tolling lanes five and 6 will the toll produce enough money to 10-lane the road. Mack’s problem is he helped get the region the $430 million the state has already budgeted for that work. He sees tolling those lanes as taxpayers paying twice. He says elected officials should look at other options.

“A toll on a road is a tax that commuters have to pay for a road they’ve already been taxed to pay for,” he said. “Until people get it in their heads that tolling is not an option they’re not going to look at other options.”

Both Lee County and Collier County commissioners are represented on the expressway authority, but when it comes to tolling I-75 they have little else in common. Lee commissioners have expressed support for the concept, even approving a Lee-only version of the project. Collier commissioners, like Mack, are against tolling.

Commissioner Frank Mann said he’s been told without tolls there’s no source of money to 10-lane the interstate.

“If you know of something please tell us,” he said. “I don’t know of any additional revenue source here or in Washington.”

There will be a new transportation bill, Mack said, though the chances of it including anything like the $81 million the last one sent to I-75 is remote. Public-private partnerships, grants and re-prioritization of federal, state and even city needs are all options, he said.

That might be easier, commissioners said, if Florida got back a whole dollar for every gas tax buck it sends to Washington. Mack said that sounds great, but without half the votes, plus one, nothing gets done in Washington and more states benefit from the current distribution than are harmed by it.

“Not one of those members is going to vote to give it back,” he said.

Mack said he’s not a fan of Pres. George W. Bush’s proposed $3.1 trillion budget. He said Republicans have talked tough about cutting spending, but neither side has produced.

“As Republicans we talked about fiscal responsibility,” he said. “It’s not happened.”