It is a pity they rejected the transportation referendum (TIA,) because we badly needed it. The business community, politicians from both parties and grassroots community groups strongly supported it.
Supporters of the TIA understand how Georgia currently ranks 48th in per capita spending on transportation, and planners predict that Metro Atlanta will become home for an additional three million people over next 30 years.
However they were bested by an equally diverse coalition of opponents, each with their own agendas. Although the majority of the tax revenues was to be spent on transit and other non-roads projects, it did not satisfy the Georgia Sierra Club's anti-roads stance.
The Georgia NAACP opposed it, because they claim that GDOT has not been using enough minority contractors. They have demanded that Obama's Department of Justice investigate this.
Most importantly the Georgia Tea Party tapped into a vast reservoir of anti-government sentiment, especially against GDOT and MARTA. Voters could not be convinced that there are legal provisions in place to assure that the tax would expire after ten years, and that the proceeds would be spent as promised.
These opposition organizations say that the results of this vote creates a mandate for a "Plan B," despite a clear disinterest on the part of the Georgia Legislature to reopen this subject. This would raise the possibility of reopening past debates about the state motor fuel tax, current budgeting restrictions on MARTA and regional governance of transportation in Atlanta.
I hope that they are right but am not betting on it. It is a lot easier to whip up constituents to vote "no" than it is to recruit them into a cogent transportation reform movement.
The Georgia Tea Party, Sierra Club and NAACP can take a well-deserved victory lap. Then they need to get busy.
They have earned themselves a mountain of work that they now own.
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