Plan To Fix Pima County Roads Appears Dead

By Claire Caulfield
Published: Tuesday, June 19, 2018 - 8:23am
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A plan to generate money to fix roads in Pima County is not expected to pass.

The Pima County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote on the temporary half-cent sales-tax increase Tuesday. It needs unanimous approval to pass, but two politicians on the board say they have a number of concerns. 

Republican Steve Christy says he supports the sales tax increase. However, he does not support a companion ordinance tied to the infrastructure measure which would increase the amount of money going to social-safety net programs.

He also said the $887 million in new revenue from the measure should be overseen by the Regional Transportation Authority, not the county.

Another opponent, Republican Ally Miller, said she would only vote for the sales-tax increase if Pima County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry resigns.

According to the Arizona Daily Star, both Miller and Christy have made fixing the crumbling roads in Southern Arizona their top political priority and have proposed their own plans in previous years.

Huckleberry has proposed a plan to raise $860 million for road repairs by locking in the property tax rate for the next 15 years. 

The current estimate to fix all streets inside the Tucson city limits is about $853 million, and to tackle all roads in Pima County would cost more than a billion dollars.