So far, there are two Bills on this subject, SJ-92 by Senator Ken Stolle, and HJ-157 by Delegate Joe Bouchard.

Both Bills are superb. Neither Bill impacts the prior Transportation Bill or the Transportation Authorities; thus, there is no risk of opening Pandora’s Box, a point that acknowledges and protects the concerns of local leaders.

The only purpose of these two Bills is to launch an official, serious study on how best to reconcile the roles and missions of multiple transportation organizations in any one metro area. Some day, without any doubt whatsoever, this will need to be done, and so:

The only principle behind these two Bills is to “Get Smart First” with serious research (to include national level comparisons) during calendar year 2008 that will enable structural change to provide professional regional transportation management for Hampton Roads right away and for Greater Fredericksburg, Greater Richmond, and other regions who will soon create their own Transportation Authorities. Completing this study in calendar year 2008 provides time, if necessary, for local and state leaders to craft legislation for the 2009 GA session to accomplish remaining (if any) final structural change requirements.

The two Bills differ slightly:
• SJ-92 (Stolle) calls for a new study commission while HJ-157 (Bouchard) assigns the study to last year’s Joint Commission on Transportation Accountability (JCTA). Both methods will work, but the Stolle procedure is deemed to be best—this is a new issue and needs a new, tailored study group able to do national level comparisons; that can address matters of organizational theory; and that understands relevant federal transportation legislation.
• SJ-92 (Stolle) studies the roles and mission of multiple regional transportation agencies in Hampton Roads (a single region) while HJ-157 (Bouchard) could study several regions. Again, either method would work—the lessons learned from the Hampton Roads study could easily be applied (and will need to be applied) to any region. For clarity on this point or if otherwise deemed necessary; the study could be applied, for example, to metropolitan areas in Virginia with a population of over 500,000 citizens.

Without question, these two Bills and the resultant Transportation Study designed to reconcile roles and missions will prove to be enormously beneficial to the Commonwealth and to Hampton Roads—this study is essential.

Ray T.