A consulting firm commissioned by Fresno County to study the impacts of the local transportation tax proposal — called Better Roads, Safe Streets — was also involved in the creation of a rival initiative unveiled earlier this year.
Fresno County spokesperson Sonja Dosti on Friday confirmed the county contracted VRPA Technologies Inc. for the roads measure study. She said in an email the contract carries a maximum payout to the company of $166,000.
Proponents of the tax proposal say VRPA will not be able to produce a fair report because members of the company’s team are also architects of Fix Our Roads — an initiative that was designed to counter ideas in the Better Roads, Safe Streets plan. Both proposals would have extended the county’s expiring 30-year-old half-cent tax that goes toward transportation, called Measure C.
“To me, it’s a conflict of interest,” Parlier Mayor Alma Beltran said Wednesday during a Fresno Council of Governments Policy Board meeting. “It’s going to be biased because it’s the opposition looking at the measure.”
Katie Doerr, assistant county counsel, responded during the meeting that staff have found no problem with the contract.
“It may be a perception,” she said, “but as far as legal conflict, there is none.”
The exchange came during a tense meeting of the Policy Board, which consists of Fresno County mayors and one supervisor. Various mayors warned their cities risk losing millions of dollars for transportation projects if nothing replaces Measure C when it expires June 30.
The Better Roads, Safe Streets citizen’s proposal aiming to replace Measure C secured enough signatures to qualify for the November ballot. Instead of voting to place the proposal on the ballot, county supervisors on July 14 voted 3-2 for a study by county staff on the proposal’s impacts.
They raised concerns that the proposal’s details left too much room for future litigation, but also criticized its focus on environmentally-friendly projects and the involvement of progressive community groups in its creation.
The impact study is expected to be presented at the supervisors’ Aug. 11 meeting, which is four days past the state’s deadline for placing local measures on the November ballot.
‘Opposition’ studying Better Roads, Safe Streets proposal
Revealed in February, the Fix Our Roads tax plan was created as an alternative to the ideas that would eventually form the Better Roads, Safe Streets plan.
Better Roads, Safe Streets intends to allocate 65% of tax revenue for local streets and 25% for public transportation. The Fix Our Roads idea pitched allocating 82% of revenue for roads and 18% for public transportation.
In March, Fix Our Roads architect Mike Leonardo presented that plan to the Board of Supervisors. He told The Bee on Thursday he is contracted with VRPA Technologies, the firm chosen to study Better Roads, Safe Streets. Leonardo added that the company is contracted to perform only “some” of the report.
In Leonardo’s Fix Our Roads presentation to the supervisors, VRPA President Georgiena Vivian was also listed as a Fix Our Roads creator.
Vivian and Leonardo declined to comment about whether VRPA would be able to fairly assess Better Roads, Safe Streets after having worked on a rival plan.
Fresno County says staff will ensure objectivity in tax proposal study
Dosti, the county spokesperson, said in her email to The Bee that county public works and planning staff and administration will “fully review and vet all information and analysis submitted by VRPA for accuracy and objectivity, then submit the final study to the Board.”
“Staff who oversee this project are non-partisan and will ensure the study’s final product is based on facts, not opinion,” Dosti said.
Dosti added that the county ultimately decided to contract a firm for the study because staff concluded they did not have the workload capacity to complete the analysis on such a short notice. Because of the timeline, she said, staff needed to identify experts who “understand Fresno County’s local and regional road systems and with whom the County already has an on-call contractual relationship.”
“VRPA Technologies has professionals with longstanding experience in transportation planning in Fresno County, making them uniquely qualified to support the Department in meeting the Board’s directive and required timeline,” she said.
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Erik is a graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism, where he helped launch an effort to better meet the news needs of Spanish-speaking immigrants. Before that, he served as editor-in-chief of his community college student newspaper, Riverside City College Viewpoints, where he covered the impacts of the Salton Sea’s decline on its adjacent farm worker communities in the Southern California desert.