Va. House Passes Transportation Plan

Other Services' Funds Would Be Shifted

RICHMOND, Feb. 6 -- Virginia's House of Delegates approved a sweeping multibillion-dollar transportation plan Tuesday, receiving bipartisan support but setting in motion a confrontation with the Senate, which has already rejected the House approach.

The 62 to 39 vote by the Republican-controlled House was a stunning turnaround for the delegates. Last year, leaders furiously opposed the slightest tax increase and helped push the state to the brink of a government shutdown. Nine Democrats supported the new bill.

The measure now heads to the Senate, where a nearly identical version of the bill was killed in the Finance Committee last week amid concerns about diverting money from other state programs to pay for roads projects. The Senate reached Tuesday's deadline for new legislation without approving a comprehensive roads measure.

That means a deal brokered by some senior Republican senators and delegates is only half-fulfilled. Still, lawmakers in both chambers said plenty of time remains before the General Assembly is scheduled to end Feb. 24.

"This plan will give Virginia's fastest-growing localities more authority to combat sprawl and traffic congestion," said House Majority Leader H. Morgan Griffith (R-Salem). "It will enact significant reforms in the state's delivery of transportation services and inject more than $2 billion in Virginia's network of roads, railways and public transit without statewide sales, income or gas tax increases."

If approved by the Senate and signed by Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D), the 91-page law would raise auto registration fees, increase taxes on diesel fuel and shift $250 million from other state programs. It would also give Northern Virginia governments power to raise taxes and fees that would generate about $400 million every year locally for roads and transit.

"I've been so desperate for transportation, I'd be willing to vote for somebody's grandma with a shovel, a bag of cement and an attitude if she's willing to work on the roads," said Del. Dave W. Marsden (Fairfax), one of the Democrats who voted for the bill.

Kaine applauded the House action, calling it "an important step," but said he remains concerned about some of its provisions and will continue to work with legislators to improve it. "Virginians deserve our best efforts to reach a common-sense solution that is comprehensive, long-term, and fair," Kaine said in a statement.

GOP lawmakers were almost giddy as they approved the plan after more than a year of stalemate. One Republican yelled, "Rock-n-roll!" as they prepared to vote. Another reflected on the unusual bipartisan spirit of the day, saying, "Kumbaya."

But the optimism that existed when Republican leaders announced the compromise at the beginning of last month is now tempered by the reality that the plan faces bipartisan opposition in the Senate.

A bitterly divided Senate had been preparing to battle over competing transportation plans -- the GOP compromise and a proposal that would impose a 5 percent sales tax on gasoline. On Tuesday, senators abandoned both, avoiding a legislative war among their members and leaving it to the House to keep alive hopes for a transportation deal before the session adjourns.

"We now await our friends in the House in sending a bill over," Sen. H. Russell Potts Jr. (R-Winchester), who sponsored the gas tax bill, said early in the day.