And you thought the conflict between the city of Tucson and the Regional Transportation Authority had been resolved.
Not so fast!
Some city of Tucson officials are unhappy with the RTA’s handling of a road project within city limits and even suggesting it violates the spirit of the agreement that resolved city-RTA disputes in late January. It has the potential to throw the RTA Next plan — another 20 years of major road projects in the Tucson area — into doubt again.
At issue is a proposed modification to the planned improvement of North First Avenue between East River Road and East Grant Road. In the original slate of projects proposed to voters in 2006, this stretch of road was slated to expand from four lanes to six lanes.
Since then, though, projected increases in traffic have not occurred, and the RTA doesn’t have enough money to pay for the projects voters approved. RTA even asked the jurisdictions in the Tucson-area for cost-saving ideas. The city came back with a proposal to keep First Avenue at four lanes while making other significant improvements.
The city went out to business owners along the stretch, and to adjacent neighborhoods, soliciting opinion. The majority approved of the change, which would keep the First Avenue project within budget, instead of the much-higher expense of expanding to six lanes as originally proposed.
“We’ve come in with a plan to carry out that project at budget, so let’s do it,” said Kevin Dahl, the Tucson City Council member in Ward 3, which includes the project area.
Instead, the RTA has sent the city through a multistep process for approval of this so-called “scope change” that hit a major obstacle April 27. That day, a project-review task force operating within RTA recommended that the First Avenue project not occur during the current RTA project, but be put on the ballot for voter approval as part of RTA Next.
“The city did a great job on the public involvement,” said Curtis Lueck, co-chair of the task force. “If this does go back to a vote, it’s going to be approved. But we have a level of discomfort, since we’re this close to the election, of not sending it back to the voters.”
Lueck, by the way, is a friend of former Pima County administrator Chuck Huckelberry and in October 2021 launched an effort encouraging residents of unincorporated Pima County to boycott the city of Tucson for major purchases. Lueck’s Boycott Tucson Sales Tax effort was a response to the city’s increase in water rates for residents of unincorporated Pima County.
One issue with his suggestion of public approval for the First Avenue change is that it would be part of a much bigger slate of proposed projects.
“There is no reason to delay advancing the 1st Avenue project any longer to wait for a future election, which has no certainty of passing and which will be decided for a variety of reasons beyond just 1st Avenue,” city Transportation and Mobility Director Samuel Credio said in a May 4 letter. “In fact, given safety issues on this corridor it would be irresponsible for the region to do so.”
There are also bigger questions of consistency and political leverage, Ward 6 City Council member Steve Kozachik said. He noted the RTA recently approved changes to voter approved projects in other jurisdictions that cost more money, unlike the proposed First Avenue changes.
On March 24, the RTA board approved spending an additional $11.2 million on Tangerine Road improvements in Marana and $15 million more on Sunset Road in unincorporated Pima County.
“To say you have to take it back to the voters is inconsistent with how they’re handling the same kind of changes in other jurisdictions and projects,” Kozachik said.
RTA spokeswoman Sheila Storm said by email the scope reduction at First Avenue is unlike the Marana and Pima County project changes because they aren’t changes to voter-approved scope.
“The RTA Technical Management Committee requested that submitted scope changes for cost reductions be reviewed by its project review task force,” she said.
However, the Sunset Road project does involve a railroad overpass that was not in the original plan for the project.
Pushing off First Avenue to RTA Next also violates the spirit of the agreement that resolves the city-RTA conflict in January, he said. That month the RTA board agreed to fund all the incomplete city projects that are part of the original RTA plan.
The city’s only leverage to get those projects done is to withhold their support for RTA Next until it’s clear the city projects will get done. If those projects are put on the RTA Next ballot issue, the city will be obligated to support that proposal just to complete projects that voters already approved.
Without those projects being completed, “we have no leverage at the table and we have to support RTA Next. I’m not going there,” Kozachik said.
The task force recommendation on First Avenue is not the final word on the proposed scope change. It must next go to the technical committee made up of top municipal administrators and then to the regional board.
- Tim Steller</&h6>
A committee walks into a bar …
Speaking of transportation committees … you know how local government is full of councils, subcommittees and task forces?
Enter Vision Zero. This is a network aimed at eliminating pedestrian deaths that the Tucson City Council voted to pursue joining at Tuesday’s meeting. A memo prepared for the city council laid out a procedural puzzle of interlocking groupings that could result from this city decision.
“If Vision Zero status were pursued many elements contained in the 5-Year Safety Plan and PSAP would be incorporated into the Vision Zero Action Plan,” the memo says. “Additionally, the city of Tucson could consider working with the Complete Streets Coordinating Council to create a Vision Zero Subcommittee to address the need for a Vision Zero Task Force.”
Got that? The council would create a subcommittee to pursue a task force.
- Tim Steller</&h6>
Taking care of business
Rep. Raúl Grijalva wants to make sure everyone knows that he’s hard at work doing congressional things despite his ranking near the top of lawmakers in the House who use proxy voting.
Cronkite News reported that the longtime Democrat from Tucson ranked fifth in the House for proxy voting in its review of 700 roll call votes since May 27, 2020. Fellow Democrat and Arizonan, Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, ranked eighth.
The House has allowed proxy voting for about two years as a pandemic precaution. Before then, House members had to be present to vote.
Neither Grijalva nor Kirkpatrick responded to calls from Cronkite during its weeks of reporting.
But after the story was published in the Star this week, Grijalva reached out to the news service run by the ASU journalism school.
Grijalva, who has contracted COVID-19 twice, told Cronkite proxy voting a tool for lawmakers “to keep themselves, other members and their families safe from exposure to COVID-19.”
“COVID-19 has shown us that Congress can adapt, and with the use of secure technology, continue to conduct the people’s business while spending more time serving their community in their districts,” Grijalva told Cronkite in a statement his office released after this story was published.
