Measure G

The Council of San Benito County Governments (COG) is San Benito County’s regional transportation planning agency. The Council of San Benito County Governments improves the mobility of San Benito County travelers by planning for and investing in a multi-modal transportation system that is safe, economically viable, and environmentally friendly. The Council of Governments is committed to enhancing and improving transportation in San Benito County.

The San Benito COG makes every effort to use resources wisely. With no locally controlled source of dollars, we struggle to compete for state and federal matching fund dollars. Even with SB1 and other funds, the burden is growing to adequately repair and upgrade our transportation system and infrastructure needs.

Guided by community feedback and conversations held throughout San Benito County, COG Board and staff members developed an Expenditure Plan, called the San Benito County Roads and Transportation Safety Investment Plan. This plan evaluates, addresses, and provides solutions for major transportation issues throughout San Benito County, including relieving traffic congestion on Highway 25, maintaining and repairing local streets and roads, increasing pedestrian and bike safety, and protecting and enhancing bus and paratransit services for residents, including seniors, people with disabilities, and youth.

The Expenditure Plan is guided by the Board adopted Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) 2040. The RTP 2040 identifies $1.8B in transportation needs for our region between 2018 and 2040, including fully funded projects like 156. The detailed Roads and Transportation Safety and Investment Plan addresses our funding shortfall for critical projects by ensuring stable local funds that qualify us for State and Federal matching funds.

Based on community input and conversations held, we have established which needs are most important to San Benito County residents and developed a tiered, needs-based priority list from feedback received. Tier 1 consists of widening Highway 25 to relieve traffic congestion. Tier 2 projects include maintaining local roads, repairing potholes, and improving traffic flow throughout the county. Tier 3 includes other areas identified as critical needs, including pedestrian and bicycle safety; mobility, bus and paratransit services for seniors, people with disabilities, and youth; administration (capped at 1 percent); and future planning and contingency.

The detailed plan, built with community and expert input, includes accountability and taxpayer safeguards and detailed project descriptions. This plan includes independent annual audits, annual reports, a citizens’ oversight committee, and administration capped at 1%. A sales tax would be combined with existing sources of local revenues for a special fund only for the projects outlined in the detailed Expenditure Plan.

24 counties in California are self-help counties. They have a stable source of local funding for their transportation needs. San Benito County has transportation needs outlined in the Expenditure Plan which can be addressed by becoming a self-help county to ensure a stable source of local funding for our San Benito County roads and highways and to become competitive for State and Federal matching funds to leverage taxpayer dollars even further.

Local funds from San Benito County for our local transportation needs are a reliable and stable source of funding that cannot be taken by the state or provided to other counties. All funds will remain in San Benito County. With reliable local funding, we qualify for state and federal matching funds to leverage taxpayer dollars even further.

Highway 25 is a shared responsibility between state transportation agencies, federal transportation agencies, and our local San Benito County. The cost for Highway 25 improvements on the Santa Clara County-San Benito County border will be shared with Santa Clara County as well.

Highway 156 does have needs that are being addressed, including widening the road to four lanes, but those improvements have already been fully funded by state highway funds and fees paid by developers building new homes in San Benito County. New residential and commercial building in the County has increased traffic on Highway 156 and developers are paying their fair share.

Our primary objective is to ensure that new development pays its fair share of the transportation costs associated with growth and the increased demand on the transportation network. New development (housing, commercial and industrial) pays for their fair share through our transportation impact mitigation program. Right now, each new house built requires payment into a fund for road improvements to fairly mitigate impact. Funds have been collected since the 1990s and have paid for other major road improvements with a $27 million investment. In 2019, $10 million of developer fees will help pay for the Highway 156 widening.  In the future, we anticipate another $247 million will be collected over the next 22 years to add significant roadway improvements as well. Even with these funds, the burden is growing to adequately repair and upgrade our transportation system and infrastructure needs.

The measure being developed is a 1% sales tax that would raise about $16M per year. This revenue would be dependent on the economy and the amount of goods sold in San Benito County and would be supplemented by state and federal matching funds.