Md. transportation secretary defends $3.3B in proposed cuts amid lawmakers’ pushback

While Maryland Transportation Secretary Paul Wiedefeld said Tuesday that the state’s plan to tackle a projected shortfall of $3.3 billion over six years doesn’t favor certain parts of the state, an influential state senator from Baltimore contended that proposed cuts would undermine the city’s economy for years.

Lawmakers on Monday, including several who play key roles in shaping transportation policy, were also hesitant to accept the proposal.

The administration of Gov. Wes Moore has proposed cutting 8% of all agency operating budgets under the state Department of Transportation, among other measures, to address a projected $3.3 billion deficit in the state’s six-year transportation program while continuing to take advantage of available federal funding, which requires matching state money to pay for large-scale projects, Wiedefeld said in a virtual interview.

The Department of Transportation previously estimated the shortfall would be $2.1 billion.

“It’s a very tough pill to swallow, I get it,” Wiedefeld said. “Over the next few months, there will be lots of discussions, whether or not this is something that we live through now, or we start to address now, (or) we start to adjust our expectations of what we deliver. I think all of that will be laid out in the very near future.”

Wiedefeld said operating costs are far outpacing revenue, and the gas and titling taxes on which the state has historically relied to offset budget holes is expected to decline as fuel efficiency and the electric vehicle market rise.

The state projected in 2019 that it would soon need more transportation revenue, though an infusion of federal COVID relief funding provided a temporary solution. As the economy shifted following the pandemic, inflation and the cost of labor and materials soared.

With growing operating costs, the state’s freedom to sell debt to support its capital construction projects has declined, too, Wiedefeld said.

Further contributing to operating costs and limiting Maryland’s ability to sell debt is its responsibility, along with Virginia and Washington, D.C., to manage about one-third of a $750 million per-year fiscal cliff that the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority is approaching.

“We tried to do this as fair as we could and tried to think of the customer,” Wiedefeld said of the administration’s proposal. “It’s statewide, it’s not aimed at any particular county or anything like that. It’s just raw numbers of what we’ve got to deal with.”

Wiedefeld said the administration isn’t recommending cuts to the operating money for transit in Baltimore.

But Sen. Cory McCray, who has represented Baltimore in the legislature since 2015, said the administration’s proposed cuts risk harming Marylanders’ well-being and livelihood, especially in the Baltimore region.

McCray, who has sponsored policies to bolster Maryland’s transit projects and increase assistance for local governments’ transportation priorities, said that Wiedefeld is “undermining the priorities of the Democratic legislature.”

The state senator, who for the last three years chaired a subcommittee on public safety, transportation and the environment, said the proposal pits regions against each other and places a disproportionate burden of overcoming the shortfall on his city, where a large number of residents rely on public transit to get to school and work, and access child care and food.

“Nobody is standing up for Baltimore City at this moment, in reference to how underwhelming transportation is,” McCray said in a phone interview. “We are so critical about education and how things impact our young people’s grades. How is transportation being left out of this conversation?”

Among the administration’s plans that McCray said would most hinder Baltimore is freezing the local share of highway user revenues, which mostly comprises taxes paid on gasoline.

County and municipal governments rely on the money to pay for road projects, and Baltimore receives, by far, the largest percentage of the total highway user revenue share distributed to local governments.

Wiedefeld said the administration has proposed deferring construction on road projects that haven’t been bid by Jan. 1 and is looking to scale back routine maintenance on roads, bridges and department facilities, which would mean reducing money for mowing grass along roads, picking up trash, and fixing guardrails and potholes.

The Maryland Transit Administration, for instance, may have less money to repair or replace train cars, leaving a jurisdiction with fewer in operation.

Because of ridership levels that have failed to rebound to pre-pandemic levels, Wiedefeld said, the administration has proposed cutting all commuter buses, which connect people from all over the state to job hubs in places like Baltimore, Annapolis and Washington, D.C.

Drivers would see higher motor vehicle fees and steeper prices for parking at BWI Airport, as well, under the administration’s plans.

Several of the proposed cuts, including for local highway user revenues and transportation infrastructure maintenance, will require approval from lawmakers during the 90-day session that begins in January.