RICHMOND, May 18 -- Republican gubernatorial candidate Jerry W. Kilgore will launch a television ad Thursday targeted to Northern Virginia that mocks the idea of raising gasoline taxes to pay for road and transit improvements in the congested region.
The 30-second spot, which will run on cable stations in most of the area, promotes Kilgore's plan to hand off transportation decisions to an authority run by local officials.
It also takes aim at Richmond politicians -- and, by extension, Democratic candidate Timothy M. Kaine, the lieutenant governor -- for frittering away taxpayer dollars without easing congestion.
"People in Northern Virginia know a thing or two about traffic. But politicians in Richmond think they know better," the announcer in the ad says. "They take our tax dollars but don't do anything."
As scenes of empty legislative hearing rooms flash across the screen, the announcer continues: "Some politicians think the solution is to raise the gas tax. Jerry Kilgore has a better plan: Form regional transportation authorities that use local people and resources to solve local traffic problems."
The Northern Virginia ad comes on the heels of two other Kilgore television ads, which began running statewide Monday. Those spots tout Kilgore's record on public safety and education.
Campaign aides said the three ads are part of a strategy to grab voters' attention in the remaining four weeks before the June 14 Republican primary. Kilgore is running against Warrenton Mayor George B. Fitch for the nomination. Kaine is unopposed for the Democratic nomination.
"Transportation is clearly going to be a key issue for Northern Virginia, particularly," Kilgore spokesman Tim Murtaugh said. "The people there live with these problems every day."
Kaine spokeswoman Delacey Skinner said voters should be skeptical of Kilgore's promise to improve transportation. She said his plan would force local governments and regions to raise taxes and would hurt efforts to adequately fund the state's schools.
"What he's not telling the voters in Northern Virginia with this ad is the way he's going to pay for transportation programs is by forcing local governments to raise their homeowner taxes," Skinner said.
Virginia's governor's race is being closely watched across the nation as a bellwether for next year's midterm congressional campaigns. Political operatives in Washington will pay particularly close attention to the media campaign waged just across the river in Northern Virginia.
The new Kilgore ad suggests that the battle over heavily populated Fairfax County and the rest of Northern Virginia might boil down to the twin issues of taxes and traffic.
Already, both campaigns have offered plans to slow increases in real estate taxes. Kilgore wants to cap assessment increases, while Kaine would allow local governments to make some of a home's value tax-free.
On transportation, the two candidates have clashed over Kilgore's proposal to give voters the right to veto tax increases. Kaine and other critics call that an abdication of the state's traditional role in paying for road and transit improvements.
"That's the ultimate cop-out . . . a despicable cop-out," said John T. "Til" Hazel, a Northern Virginia developer who is backing Sen. H. Russell Potts's independent bid for governor. Hazel, who supported a proposal in 2002 to raise the sales tax for road projects, said, "Kilgore's approach is not even a thinly disguised effort to offload the responsibility of the state."
Dave Guernsey, owner of an office supply company that puts 100 delivery trucks on the road each day, said neither Kaine nor Kilgore is addressing the traffic crunch head-on. "Once again, it's this campaign rhetoric from these politicians who take a known problem and address it with lip service," Guernsey said.
But Murtaugh said: "It is remarkable that those who thought it was important to listen to the voice of the people three years ago now don't want to because it doesn't suit their political ends. Kaine doesn't even have a transportation plan on the table. If he's going to raise the gas tax, why doesn't he just say so?"
