Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves has been elected twice by the state of Mississippi, and both times the Republican has appointed Willie Simmons D-Cleveland to chair the Senate Transportation Committee.
That’s not bad for a Democrat serving with a Republican majority in the senate, Simmons, who represents Bolivar, Tallahatchie and Sunflower Counties, told The Enterprise-Tocsin in a recent interview.
“That’s pretty significant for a Democrat under a Republican lieutenant governor, who not only appointed me the first time but reappointed me when he was re-elected,” Simmons said.
Over the past six years, Simmons has watched his district’s infrastructure fall into further decay, and during that time, he has also seen a Mississippi Legislature become tighter with money and more determined than ever not to raise taxes.
Simmons said that sentiment is shared across party lines among the membership of the Senate.
“They don’t want to vote to raise the taxes and the fees,” Simmons, who has advocated for a hike in the state’s fuel tax, said. “Even if the leadership wanted to do it, it would be a hard push and we’d be hard pressed to get the membership to come around to support it.”
The Senate does seem to be in favor of a piece of legislation recently introduced by Reeves, with Simmons and Finance Chairman Joey Fillingane R-Sumrall, serving as the chief architects.
The BRIDGE Act is a $1.1 billion proposal that promises to raise zero taxes on the citizens of Mississippi.
“With the BRIDGE Act, the Senate has put forward a comprehensive plan to address critical road and bridge needs in our communities while taking advantage of any federal assistance that may be available under President Trump’s plan,” Reeves said in a statement after the Senate recently approved the legislation by a 36-14 vote. “The state can repair its infrastructure without raising taxes and by prioritizing spending on actual needs not administrative costs.”
Simmons said it’s a good start in the right direction but hardly solves the infrastructure needs of the state.
It does, however, have special provisions for the Delta region, an area that has struggled to keep up its roads and bridges because of the current funding formula, which Simmons says is based on population and economic development needs.
If lawmakers pass this legislation, and the Federal government eventually passes the $1.5 trillion infrastructure bill proposed by President Donald Trump in February, Mississippi could be on the road to recovery when it comes to infrastructure.
A Long Look at Infrastructure
Simmons has been looking at the state’s infrastructure problems for the majority of his term as chairman of the Transportation Committee.
He said Reeves formed a special committee to look at roads and bridges in 2013.
Simmons has long been in favor of raising revenue through the fuel tax, something he said has been long overdue since it has not been raised since 1989.
“Six cents keeps us around what other states around us are doing,” Simmons said. “As a matter of fact, it keeps us in most cases cheaper than other states… We identified the problem and that’s that the current funding formula is inadequate because we have not raised fees at the fuel tank since 1989, and everything else has skyrocketed and is going up.”
Simmons said the rise in the fuel tax could generate as much as $125 million for the state.
Some legislators are currently backing a proposed lottery, while others are pushing an internet sales tax.
Reeves has been outspoken, generally, on all of these ideas, but Simmons said the lieutenant governor is open to hearing any proposal.
“Each year, we’ve said we needed to do something, and one of the questions I get from him all of the time is ‘do you have the votes to pass that kind of legislation and to raise taxes and fees?’ And I have to tell him I don’t have the votes,” Simmons said.
Heard Loud and Clear
In September, Simmons told the citizens of his district that they needed to contact their elected officials and put pressure on them to address infrastructure.
Since that time, he said lawmakers have been hearing from a variety of sources within the state’s counties, who have been affected by the many closed roads and bridges.
“We’re hearing from the farmers. We’re hearing from the first responders, like the fire and ambulance services,” Simmons said. “They can’t access certain communities and/or homes in a timely manner. They can get there by going around, which may be another 10 or 15 minutes. You’re talking about life, and you’re talking about the possible loss of a home when you have to take an additional 15 minutes to get to where you’re going. Superintendents of education are concerned because it’s running up their transportation costs. It’s a problem that’s growing in leaps and bounds, and it needs to be fixed.”
Simmons said there was something different about Reeves’ approach to infrastructure when the 2018 legislative session began.
“This year, he decided we had kicked the can down the road too many times already, and he wanted to do something, and he wanted to do something meaningful and significant,” Simmons said.
Simmons and Fillingane went to work on finding a way to channel as much money into infrastructure as possible without raising taxes.
The BRIDGE Act
Otherwise known as Senate Bill 3046, The BRIDGE Act ( an acronym for Building Roads. Improving Development. Growing the Economy) has many components, including funding for the local system bridge program, railroad improvements, repairing water and sewer systems and dam maintenance.
It includes a $150 million bond bill, Simmons said, and they have packaged three years of the local state bridge program, which will be $60 million instead of the normal $20 million.
The program was not funded during the 2017 legislative session.
Simmons said the money fluctuates year-to-year, so he could not give a specific amount Sunflower County would receive from that.
“It will be a nice sum, because it’s going to be $60 million as opposed to what we normally do, and that’s $20 million,” he said. “What that will do is put the counties in a position to deal with many of the bridges like you see in Sunflower County that need to be repaired and replaced.”
The bill also includes funding for Simmons’ home region, the Delta.
“We placed emphasis on the Delta,” Simmons said. “We wanted to make sure the Delta was given some special dollars, so that the Delta wouldn’t be left out when you look at the current formulas in place.“
Simmons said the decay of the Delta’s roads and bridges have hurt the area’s economic development potential.
“If you don’t have the proper infrastructure, you won’t be able to address it,” he said. “If our farmers have bails of cotton they can’t get out because one or two bridges are out, then you’re putting that farmer in jeopardy in not being able to get their product to where it needs to go.
Simmons also said the bill creates an emergency bridge program, where counties will have more discretion, while working with the state, in which bridges will take priority.
Moving Forward
Simmons calls the BRIDGE Act a good start.
That’s because it is about one-third of the money he says is needed to fully address the state’s problems.
“Even this bill, at $1.1 billion is not fixing the problem, because we need about $3.5 billion,” he said. “This is just a down payment.”
The House has also done its share of due diligence on infrastructure needs with the passage of House Bill 722, which is set to divert millions in use tax dollars to municipalities, which typically get a smaller share of what’s given to counties to address infrastructure needs.
Also, Simmons said Trump’s $1.5 trillion federal bill played a role in the crafting of the BRIDGE Act.
“Some of the programs we have in the bill will be very beneficial if what the president proposed becomes law,” Simmons said. “Based on some of the things he has proposed in it, such as a focus on rural areas and a focus on some kind of a match.”
Simmons said Trump’s proposal included what he called a three-year look back, which could provide an 80-20 match on funds spent by counties and cities dating back three years.
“We went on and made dollars available to the counties and the state so that we can go on and invest,” Simmons said. “That could put Mississippi in a great position, because the money we have already expended on our roads and bridges can be put in our application as a match, which puts us in a position to where we can get more money from the Federal government.”
