The Concord City Council — along with other city councils — has been advocating with state leaders for local road repair funding, its importance to reducing auto maintenance costs, to ensure a strong economy, and for safety (reducing accidents due to poor road conditions).

We have explained that the self-help funding that exists both locally and regionally is not enough. It’s been 23 years since California has increased funding for transportation, and that money has lost about 50 percent of its buying power.

Traffic and transportation needs are at the front of many of our minds in Marin. Municipalities and agencies across the county are constantly examining how they can make the worthy investments needed in our roads and transportation infrastructure.

At the state level, California is overdue in addressing our local roads, highways and bridges, and state funding reductions have drastically impacted local road maintenance programs.

That’s why we are thanking state Sen. Mike McGuire for coauthoring Senate Bill 1.

by Heidi Harmon, mayor of San Luis Obispo

This week, the California Legislature will vote on a transportation funding package that will generate $5.2 billion a year for the next 10 years.

The behemoth transportation funding bill passed by the Legislature this week conforms to the poet John Godfrey Saxe’s famous aphorism about laws and sausages — that both “cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made.” The last leg of the plan’s journey through the Sacramento meat grinder only added more of the legislative equivalent of unsavory animal parts.

Many people won’t see the votes cast by Republican Senator Anthony Cannella and Democratic Assemblyman Adam Gray to raise the state tax gas 12 cents as visionary. Those people suffer from one of two misfortunes: they don’t live around here, or they’re shortsighted.

Gray and Cannella grasped an opportunity that could transform our region.

“The Central Valley often feels it is being neglected – and often it is,” said Gov. Jerry Brown in explaining why he met the demands of Cannella and Gray. “This is recognition of that.”

Pardon us, but didn’t Santa Cruz County voters just put in place a tax to fix our roads and improve transportation?

Yes, we did.

So, should local residents who drive vehicles, and use roads and other infrastructure, be upset over yet another state tax measure that will make it yet more expensive to work and live here?

Because Gov. Jerry Brown, through some pretty impressive arm twisting and politicking, convinced enough legislators to pass a $52 billion tax measure Thursday night that will jack up gasoline prices and add a new levy to vehicle registration fees.

Gov. Jerry Brown and legislators showed what they can do when they are committed.

Most of the time, legislation — especially solving long-term problems — moves like icebergs.

The transportation bill proved that if legislators really want to get something done, they can.

Brown, committed to fixing and improving California’s transportation system, personally pushed through legislation to raise the gasoline tax and vehicle fees to generate money needed to fuel the much-needed work.

When the state Legislature did what it had to do to find a solution to start fixing California’s battered highways, bridges and roads, it did so on a mostly partisan manner that revealed a) Gov. Jerry Brown successfully pushed an unpopular tax and fee increase because $52 billion will not appear from out of thin air over the next 10 years; and, b) Republicans continue to mistrust Democrats whenever there is a tax increase, no matter what the cause is.