Wed April 18, 2007
Roads ride to top of city's $736 million bond wish list
By John Estus
Staff Writer

City officials on Tuesday unveiled a draft of what would be the most expensive bond issue in Oklahoma City history.

Road improvements will make up the bulk of the $736 million proposal. Also on the city's wish list is a $26 million face-lift for the downtown police headquarters and municipal court buildings, and $77 million for parks projects.

The bond package should be finished by summer's end. It goes to voters in December.

Until then, city officials want more public input.

"We need to make sure we're communicating and talking to our citizens,” City Manager Jim Couch said.

Couch said the most effective way officials have received public input so far is last year's citizen survey, which asked people to rate their willingness to support a list of possible bond issue projects.

"It let us know pretty loud and clear what the citizens are interested in,” city spokeswoman Kristy Yager said.

The overwhelming message? Fix the roads; 89 percent of those surveyed support it.

The bond proposal comes as city leaders continue to discuss a possible MAPS 3 initiative. A decision about whether voters will be asked to support MAPS 3 could come as early as this summer.

City leaders have not identified what type of projects could be funded with a possible MAPS 3 and instead have asked citizens to submit their own ideas through a Web site: MAPS 3 | Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett (http://www.maps3.org).

The $550 million in proposed road-related projects is more money than all bond issue projects since 2000 combined. City voters approved $340 million in 2000.

Bond issues typically pay for a city's infrastructure needs and few are more essential, expensive and popular with voters than road improvements.

Extensive road projects are proposed citywide. The largest — by dollar amount — include:

•$14 million to widen Kelley Avenue between Memorial Road and Wilshire Boulevard.

•$10.8 million for resurfacing between Western Avenue and Interstate 235 between NW 23 and NW 10.

•$8.8 million for resurfacing between Kelley and Martin Luther King avenues between NE 23 and NE 10.

Fixes for police, golf
The proposal also includes about $31 million in improvements to police headquarters and city golf courses, despite survey results showing those projects are the two residents are least willing to support.

Couch reminded city council members at a special workshop Tuesday that some projects still have "an overwhelming need,” even if they're not popular with voters.

Last year's survey included a number of questions about funding a light rail system, but no light rail projects made it to the bond issue proposal.

Couch called light rail and other public transit needs an "emerging issue” and said the decision to place questions about it on the survey was made more out of curiosity than immediate need.

"Our current transportation model is unsustainable,” Mayor Mick Cornett said. "A key funding issue for Oklahoma City and the metropolitan area is going to be the state's ability or willingness to get involved.”

During the next state legislative session, Cornett said, he will ask lawmakers to begin discussing a statewide public transportation funding effort that would work toward light rail and other options.

In a presentation to civic leaders last year, the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber presented a plan to implement a commuter rail line by 2030 with routes running north and south between Edmond and Norman, and east and west between downtown and Midwest City.

The plan also calls for inner-city transit improvements.

Seriously...that's it for road projects? I hope that those unnamed projects span more city-wide for resurfacing than that.

Those are obviously just a few examples. It's $550 million.

The City spent, and I'm guessing, in excess of $100,000.00 to conduct a survey to find out exactly how we the taxpayers of OKC would like to see our $736,000,000.00 spent. The results left little doubt that streets/roads repair and resurfacing was far and away the top priority, with the upgrading of fire equipment/protection a strong second. Police and golf improvements were far,far down the list of the projects we want to support

Yet when the City Manager and his staff rolled out their proposed bond allocation package police, and golf projects accounted for $31,000,000.00 compared to $10,000,000.00 for fire. So why did City management spend all that money to seek our imput as to what we wanted just to ignore our answers?

Seems the City Manager could have saved us a lot of general fund tax dollars, and just told us how he was going to spend the bond money. Just my opinion.

If you reread the article, he say that those things are NEEDED so badly that they had to go ahead and put them on there, despite them not being a high priority on the survey.

If you've seen our city parks, I can't say I disagree.

I was not referring to our City parks. I agree they could and should be better. My issue had to do with golf courses not parks. The 31 mil. was for Police headquarters and golf. Those two projects were at the bottom of the list. Though I don't play golf, I realize a lot of people do. Most of my closest friends do. In fact they pay a lot of money to play. So let the fees sustain the cost of operating the City courses not tax dollars.

If the golf courses are in such dire need, raise the user fees. My major complaint has more to do with the fact that City management spent lots of money to ask us what we wanted and/or what we didnt want. If they are going to ignore the survey what was the point in conducting it to begin with. Again. Just my opinion.

I have to agree with jbrown, why those things may not be popular, they are still much needed issues. Have you seen our public golf courses? Look at all the clubhouses. Most were built in or before the 1970's and very outdated. Heck, I'd play alot more if upgrades were made. The city can use golf courses for tourism tax dollars but we have to reinvest in them. Look at public courses in Florida, Arizona, Texas, California (Oklahoma is a big golfing state too by the way). By that mentality, why not raise user fees on roads? i.e. turnpikes, tollways. It's a city asset just as everything else such as parks, etc.

metro

I have no issue with the fact that you agree with jbrown. And don't have an issue per se with the sport of golf. I'm not anti golf. You ask have I seen our public courses. As I stated previously, I don't play, so no I have not. If I did I'm sure I would feel differently. I would never take the position that golf is not popular, in fact it's quite the opposit.

It just wasn't popular with the taxpayers that responded to the survey. At least from the standpoint of spending any of the revenue generated from the sale of the G.O. Bonds. When ask to rank specific projects that would cause a person to support a bond election. Golf was dead last. When ask what project(s) would cause a person to oppose the election, golf was the first. What that tells me is, don't expend any of these funds on golf, and you have my support, and my yes vote. Spend any of these funds on golf and you will have my opposition, and my no vote.

Right or wrong I guess my mentality comes from the fact I don't play golf. Therefore I would rather my tax dollars be spent on streets,bridges, traffic flow, fire protection, things that we all use, as opposed to golf courses and clubhouses things that some use and some don't. Maybe the City shouldn't be in the golf business. Maybe we should leave golfing in the hands of the private sector.

Again just my opinion

I agree that golf courses are getting too much money in this bond issue. The city manager says that investments are really needed in golf, but there are other areas where investments are 'really needed', that aren't popular with tax payers, that are getting the short end of the stick in this bond issue, such as public transportation. Arguably, public transportation is more important than golf, as it gets people to work and shop, and thus is a public infrastructure. Opponents of mass transit often claim that buses are subsidized, while cars and trucks pay their own way, but if this was true, Oklahoma City wouldn't need to borrow a half billion dollars, to pay for road repair, on top of all the other money borrowed for the same reason the past few years. All transportation modes are subsidized. More investments in public transportation would take some of the traffic off the roads, this would mean less repair costs over time.

Also, I've heard that 1/3 of the money allocated to mass transit in the bond proposal will go to buy those fake trolley buses. I ride the bus with reasonable regularity, and I hate it when one of those fake trolleys shows up on my regular route. They are uncomfortable to ride in -- I don't think they have shock absorbers and the wooden benches may be nice eye candy, they aren't very comfortable to sit on.

"During the next state legislative session, Cornett said, he will ask lawmakers to begin discussing a statewide public transportation funding effort that would work toward light rail and other options.

In a presentation to civic leaders last year, the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber presented a plan to implement a commuter rail line by 2030 with routes running north and south between Edmond and Norman, and east and west between downtown and Midwest City."

This is promising, but 2030??? Come on, it should be more like 2020 or 2025 at the latest. Denver planned and built its SE light rail/commuter line in 7 years, and that involved building new lines through downtown. The Edmond-downtown OKC-Norman line only involves building new tracks in the BNSF ROW, station improvements, and of course the trains. I would hope the Edmond-OKC-Norman line would be running by 2015, and the WRWA-downtown OKC-Midwest City line by 2025, with complimentary light rail throughout the downtown and inner city by 2030.