Joe Denault is an articulate and thoughtful man whose mission is to deliver a troubling message to as many West Virginians as possible.
Speaking Wednesday in Beckley to a group of community and government leaders, Denault conveyed the bad news:
West Virginia’s roads and bridges are crumbling. The cost of repairing them keeps soaring, while the revenue to repair them keeps shrinking. Highway projects, severely needed all over the state, are decades away from being funded.
And no one is seriously taking a look at what needs to be done to correct the growing crisis, Denault said.
Denault is the chairman of West Virginians for Better Transportation, an organization that seeks to inform state residents and leaders of the crisis.
“Nearly half, 46 percent, of the bridges in the state’s interstate system will need significant repairs by the year 2026,” Denault said. “Funds aren’t available and won’t be available from the federal government.”
“Twenty-seven percent of West Virginia’s major roads are in poor or mediocre condition,” he said.
This statistic matters, Denault explained, because the condition of the roads is an indicator of their safety.
“West Virginia’s highway fatality rate is 50 percent above the national average,” he said. “The national fatality rate is dropping, and ours is up 9 percent.”
“West Virginia will need to add additional lanes along 142 miles of its existing 555-mile interstate system by the year 2026 in order to relieve growing traffic congestion,” Denault said. “The money is not there to do this.”
The problem, of course, is money — billions of dollars needed over the next several years.
The state has a list of 170 proposed future transportation projects. The estimated total cost is $20 billion. With current funding levels, Denault said, the state will complete only 8 percent of these projects in the next 24 years.
“Parts of the state have very important projects that will never be considered because the funding is not there,” he said. “We can’t wait 24 years.”
While government leaders at Wednesday’s meeting agreed the state’s roads face a crisis, there was little agreement about how to raise the billions of dollars needed.
All options Denault offered for raising the money would cost state residents in taxes, tolls or fees.
Denault admits generating the revenue will be “painful,” and believes state politicians will shy away from action until the people of West Virginia demand the roads are fixed.
But most government leaders at the meeting had not received such a mandate from their constituents, and voiced concerns about raising taxes.
“How do we justify to our constituents, who have paid and paid and paid, that this is the way to go?” Delegate Linda Sumner, R-Raleigh, asked. “To think that raising fees and taxes is an innovative way of thinking — we’ve been doing that for years.”
Several community leaders from southern West Virginia expressed concern that southern counties had not received their fair share of highway projects.
Residents in southern West Virginia will resist paying taxes to pay for projects in other parts of the state, said Bill Baker, chairman of the Beckley-Raleigh County Transportation Authority.
“You’ve got to show people in southern West Virginia that you care about their projects and concerns before you get their support,” he said.
Denault explained that community leaders throughout the state have their individual concerns about how to tackle the problem. He urged leaders in Beckley to assist in developing a solution to the crisis that affects all West Virginians.
“The reality is that it affects everybody,” he said. “If we are going to keep our children here in West Virginia, we have got to have good jobs that can provide them a standard of living. We think transportation is part of that.”