Barker: No Gas Tax Hike? Close Roads

Gov. Butch Otter has another alternative in his tool box for responding to the Idaho Legislature’s refusal to raise taxes to meet the $240 million annual road maintenance shortfall. He can reduce the size of the state’s road system. That sounds like blasphemy, but hear me out. When the U.S. Forest Service backlog on road maintenance ballooned to $10 billion over its 400,000 miles of roads in 192 million acres of national forest, the Clinton administration came back with the 2001 roadless rule. It banned new roads in 58 million acres of national forest.The rule didn’t solve the problem but it changed the debate. Most of the people who opposed the roadless rule were residents of rural areas in national forests who more regularly used the roads that frankly were getting a lot less use than the costs of maintenance justified/Rocky Barker, Idaho Statesman. More here.

• Monday 5.18/Unequivocal Notion
• Review: Mr. Lincoln’s Book/Randy Stapilus
  
• Alternative energy isn’t a business, it’s a religion/Clayton Cramer
• A rifle, a laptop, and a comment/Free In Idaho!
• Handicappers’ early 1st CD predictions/MountainGoat Report
  

Question: Does Rocky Barker have the right idea? If the Legislature won’t vote to increase the gas tax to fix roads, should the state inventory Idaho’s road system — and stop fixing certain ones that aren’t used that much?