Tollbooth politics

QUESTIONS about whether Governor Romney would interject himself into the gubernatorial campaign have just been answered. He got involved yesterday, via his appointees on the board of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority who voted to end all Pike tolls west of Route 128 effective June 30 -- but put off the final decision until Nov. 15, a week after the election.

Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, the Republican candidate for governor, appeared with Romney yesterday to endorse the rollback, but she'll have much explaining to do during the rest of the campaign about how her administration would make up the lost toll revenues.

The turnpike board was acting on a report by Eric Kriss, a former Romney fiscal adviser, who recommended that all tolls be lifted, except on the harbor tunnels. Ending tolls on the turnpike in Newton and Boston would, however, require legislative approval. These funds are essential to pay off the debt incurred to build the depressed Central Artery.

Kriss argues that the cost associated with employing toll-takers consumes 29.3 percent of the tolls they collect; therefore the whole system is flawed and should be eliminated. But even by his reckoning, that leaves 70.7 percent of the toll revenues for maintenance and payment of turnpike debt. Perhaps the toll-takers are overcompensated, but eliminating them with the tolls would shift responsibility for the turnpike onto the overburdened Highway Department.

``Capital investment of $80-$100 million annually is needed to maintain the existing MTA [turnpike] infrastructures," Kriss acknowledges in the report. It is irresponsible to propose cutting off one revenue stream without proposing another that would allow the Highway Department to keep the turnpike and the other state highways and bridges in good repair.

``The western drivers of Massachusetts have been ripped off," Romney said at the press conference. Motorists west of Route 128 have legitimate reason to wonder whether their highways are being under maintained because of the overruns on the Central Artery. But the artery project was essential to relieve a transportation logjam in the heart of the largest city in New England. Massachusetts has the resources to adequately maintain its transportation systems if political leaders summon the will to deploy them properly.

Nobody likes paying tolls. But user fees, whether tolls or the gasoline tax, have long been the preferred way to pay for highway maintenance. A special commission is in the midst of reviewing revenue and cost-saving alternatives. The Romney administration should have waited for its report instead of unveiling this campaign-season gimmick.