Improve our Tulsa 2: Why You Should Vote Against the Street Package

Brent Isaacs, a native Tulsan and city planner active for many years in advocating for a better Tulsa, has has written a piece below about why you should to vote against the first item on the November 12, 2019, Tulsa ballot. Labeled on the first sheet of the ballot as "PROPOSITION IMPROVE OUR TULSA (Streets and Transportation Systems Construction and Repair Bonds)," it is a $427,000,000 general obligation bond issue "for the purpose of constructing, reconstructing, improving, repairing and/or purchasing streets and transportation systems," which will be paid for by an increase in property tax rates within the City of Tulsa.

When Brent posted an earlier version of this essay on Facebook, I commented that the Engineering Services Department is like a computer, and it's running a program that it was given to run 50 years ago. The neighborhood-destroying zombie project that is the Elm Creek West Pond is another case in point. It's time that Tulsans, through our vote on November 12 and through our support for candidates for mayor and city council in 2020, terminated the current, outdated program and launched a newer, better program that takes these economic realities into account. He has kindly granted permission to publish an updated version of his essay here at BatesLine.

Why I am Voting No on Improve our Tulsa 2's Streets and Transportation Package

Brent C. Isaacs, AICP, 10/29/19

Tulsa is trapped in a structural infrastructure deficit- and that's why I am voting no on Improve our Tulsa 2, item one on November 12. Item one is a general obligation bond for mostly street projects. Say what? Why would I vote no? Wouldn't that make the problem worse?

I get that there are legitimate capital improvement needs for our city, the third penny sales tax is up for renewal and there will be no tax increase required. I wanted to vote yes, and will do so on item three that would create a standing "Rainy Day" fund for the City, and leaning toward voting yes on item two, for all the non-street projects that will be funded by extending the third penny sales tax. Normally, I am in favor of all propositions funding capital improvement projects but this time I have decided to vote no on the streets package. Here's why.

1. When it comes to streets, Improve our Tulsa 2 is doing the same thing we have been doing for over 40 years and it hasn't worked. Yes, streets have been widened and improved but we are still are no closer to ending our structural infrastructure deficit.

The land area in Tulsa grew dramatically in 1966 when the number of square miles in the city limits more than doubled nearly overnight. While that allowed for a population increase and allowed the City to capture sales tax revenue from the booming growth to the south and east, it also created demand, particularly for new street infrastructure, that has yet to be met. For a while, as the growth periphery continued to largely be in Tulsa's city limits, sales tax dollars continued to increase. However, over the last 20 years, as the growth periphery has moved beyond the Tulsa city limits to places like Jenks, Bixby and Broken Arrow, the growth in sales tax revenue has slowed dramatically and City operating costs just to maintain the same level of service have outpaced available tax revenue. The population of the city of Tulsa has been around 400,000 for nearly the same time frame.

Now we are faced with not only having to add infrastructure just to catch up with all the sprawling growth for neighborhoods developed long ago, but also having to rehabilitate infrastructure that was built in the 1960s, 70s and 80s that is largely worn out. Item one, the general obligation bond for $427,000,000, includes $64,000,000 for additional street widening with $295,800,000 for existing street repairs. But, this is just a portion of what's reported to be needed. The current capital improvement needs list is estimated to be in the billions. This is occurring as the city is no longer growing in population, sales tax revenues are flat and operating costs for the City of Tulsa are increasing faster than tax revenue.

2. The current growth patterns that have been fueled by our street infrastructure investments aren't sustainable.

The reality is that we cannot continue to invest in street infrastructure that does not more than pay for itself and fund its replacement with regular sales tax revenue. Otherwise, we will never get caught up. By continuing the cycle of investing in more of the same infrastructure, we are facilitating low density sprawling development that will not adequately pay for the cost of this infrastructure.

Joe Minicozzi, Principal and Founder of fiscal, development and tax analysis firm Urban 3 (http://www.urban-three.com/), stated in a 2012 Atlantic Cities article, now Citylab (https://www.citylab.com/life/2012/03/simple-math-can-save-cities-bankruptcy/1629/) "Low-density development isn't just a poor way to make...tax revenue. It's extremely expensive to maintain. In fact, it's only feasible if we're expanding development at the periphery into eternity, forever bringing in revenue from new construction that can help pay for the existing subdivisions we've already built."

This describes the situation in Tulsa accurately. The only way to fund all this street infrastructure and even possibly get caught up is to dramatically increase sales and property taxes. This is largely viewed as being politically unfeasible and, as I argue below, is economically unwise.

3. Infrastructure should generate additional wealth for a city, not create additional tax burdens.

Minicozzi and Chuck Marohn, Founder and President of Strong Towns (https://www.strongtowns.org/), an organization promoting smart, incremental development that is financially sustainable for cities, have created models showing the amount of property tax created per acre for different types of development. They have showed that while everyone thinks a big Walmart on a suburban site will generate an enormous amount of tax revenue, because of the infrastructure required to service such a large site, the amount of property tax revenue per acre is much lower than traditional denser development found in downtowns and older urban neighborhoods. While the City of Tulsa is dependent on sales tax, not property tax, revenue to fund operations, locally the Urban Data Pioneers civic group attempted to do a similar analysis of Tulsa development patterns based on sales tax revenue in 2017. The picture was largely similar.

Thus, for example, when considering street improvements, we need to look at more than just traffic counts or the pavement condition index. We need to consider what type of development will this facilitate and will it generate additional tax revenue that more than covers the cost of the improvement and provides replacement cost funding.

4. The list of street projects included in a proposal needs to be subjected to more than just the analysis from Engineering Services. The economic value created and whether the improvement facilitates the type of city Tulsans desire should be part of the selection criteria.

As I currently understand it, Engineering Services maintains the list of needed capital improvement projects. Street projects are reviewed and ranked to determine which have the greatest need based on traffic counts, age, pavement condition index, etc. However, nowhere in these is the level of economic activity, tax revenue likely to be generated and whether the type of development helps create Tulsans' desired city, considered. With a few exceptions, Engineering Services largely controls the capital improvement process.

The most recent gauge of what Tulsans would like for our city is the Tulsa Comprehensive Plan, that came out of PlaniTulsa. It represents the views what thousands of Tulsans said they wanted our city to look like. Currently, the plan is administered by the Tulsa Planning Office at INCOG. They should have a formal role in reviewing and determining which capital improvement projects are needed to achieve this vision.

Besides opening the process up to the Tulsa Planning Office, there should be an independent economic analysis done for projects to determine whether they generate additional tax revenue or economic activity that exceeds their original and replacement costs. Ultimately, a project selection committee should be formed that makes the final recommendations on projects based on these criteria to the Mayor.

5. The City has done a poor job managing and completing construction on existing capital improvement projects that have already been funded.

You don't have to look far to see projects, particularly projects impacting our streets, that have taken a really long time or have been redone multiple times in Tulsa in recent years. As I speak, there has been a large hole on Denver right in front of 5th Street by Central Library and the Tulsa County Courthouse that has been there for weeks and weeks. Nothing seems to really be happening but it is causing back ups regularly for people going to court, the library or the BOK Center. I don't understand why there hasn't been more a sense of urgency in getting this inconvenient construction completed. Or, outside of downtown, Lewis between 11th and 21st Streets has been in different stages of construction for years. First, it was redoing the intersection at 15th and Lewis, then multiple projects from 15th to 21st Streets, then work from the Broken Arrow to 11th Street to narrow the street creating on street parking. Now, with the work on the Broken Arrow Expressway bridges over 15th and Lewis, the area is torn up again. I don't understand why these projects, along with countless others, couldn't have been better coordinated and completed in a much shorter timeframe.

Tulsans have expressed frustration with continual street construction. Bumper stickers have been spotted that say "Tulsa...finish something!" or "Welcome to the City of Road Construction". I realize that construction is often the price of progress but can't we figure out a way to do it better? Other cities don't seem to have as much constant construction as Tulsa does.

While some people will say voting no on the street improvements will halt progress in our city, I disagree. There are plenty of capital improvement projects, including streets, that have been approved by the voters but have yet to be completed. In the meantime, can't we rethink our street capital improvements approach and come back with a new proposal that considers these options above? Tulsans deserve better and we should start now.

Brent C. Isaacs, AICP, is a local urban planner in Tulsa.