A board that oversees billions of dollars worth of transportation projects across Pima County is closing in on a March 2026 election for a 20-year, $2.67 billion regional transportation plan.
The Regional Transportation Authority Board zeroed in on a version of the RTA Next plan that includes more than $1.2 billion in new roadway projects across the region, RTA Executive Director Michael Ortega said during the Aug. 15 meeting.
The RTA Board is expected to approve the final version of the RTA Next plan at its Aug. 25 meeting.
The plan will then go to Pima County Board of Supervisors, which has until Sept. 10 to call for the March election. That could happen when the board meets Sept. 2.
Pima County voters will be asked in March to approve a nearly $3 billion plan for major transportation projects over the next 20 years.
Verlon Jose, chairman of the Tohono O’odham Nation, and Supervisor Matt Heinz, who represents the county on the RTA Board, voted against taking the plan to voters in March. Both argued that a ballot measure on the plan should be pushed back to November 2026 to allow for more public engagement.
“I think if we want to avoid a March calamity, we need the public involved way more than they are,” Heinz said ahead of the RTA board’s vote. “We need to devote the necessary time to get this right. I think the November election will be a time when this frankly will be more likely to pass, and it’ll be a better overall product.”
A March 2026 ballot measure is being pursued because delaying the vote to November of next year would put regional transit funding for 2026 at-risk, Ortega has said. The half-cent sales tax that voters approved in 2006 for the original transportation plan expires in June 2026.
Ortega had previously proposed that the RTA board ask voters to approve a 10-year sales tax extension to fund the first half of the two-decade plan. But that proposal drew concern from business advocates. The RTA Board instead opted to pursue a 20-year, half-cent sales tax alongside the 20-year plan for projects.
The latest version of the 20-year transportation plan, “Option 3,” includes about $1.2 billion in roadway projects and about $236 million in arterial rehabilitation for roadways in poor condition.
There’s $244 million in the plan for safety and ADA projects, such as $100 million budgeted for “pedestrian and bikeway improvements” in Tucson, and $726 million for regional transit.
The plan also includes more than $262 million to complete a number of projects included in the original plan voters approved in 2006, now called RTA 1, that were pushed back or delayed because of funding shortfalls.
