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Letter to the Editor: Vote for V

Marty Schoenberg
President, Truckee Police Officers' Association

Those of you who lived in or visited Truckee prior to 1993 likely remember the horrible condition of our roads at that time. Driving a car or bicycle, or even walking across the street, was a hazardous undertaking. I remember constantly maneuvering through a gauntlet of perilous potholes wherever I drove in town. Then, in 1993, the town incorporated. One of the primary motivating factors for incorporation was the dreadful condition of our roads. Upon incorporation, Truckee inherited 140 miles of chronically neglected roadway from Nevada County and began the slow process of attempting to address this critical infrastructure problem with limited resources. In 1998, to assist the town with this monumental task, 72 percent of Truckee voters approved Measure A, a one-half cent sales tax that has since been used to maintain our roads. With the additional resources available due to Measure A, the Town of Truckee has done a superb job of repairing potholes, conducting slurry sealing and roadway reconstruction, installing guardrails, widening shoulders for bike lanes, addressing drainage issues, and implementing other important roadway improvements. Quite simply, the vital maintenance and improvements funded by Measure A have made our roads much safer and our daily lives easier and less stressful.

Measure A will expire in 2010, and its expiration will eliminate approximately $2,100,000 in annual funding for maintenance and improvement of our roadways. That loss of funding is likely to cause deterioration in the condition of Truckee’s roads, and could ultimately leave us where we were when we inherited poorly maintained roadways from the County ” dodging dangerous potholes. But there’s a way to avert that situation. Measure V on the November ballot would extend the one-half cent sales tax implemented previously by Measure A, so that the town can continue the excellent road maintenance that we need and have enjoyed during the past ten years. Measure V will not increase the sales tax rate or add a new tax; it will simply extend the existing rate, so that we can continue to have well-maintained roads.

As a police officer, I know how important road maintenance is to public safety in our town ” for motorists, bicyclists, and pedestrians. Please support Measure V, and help keep Truckee safe.


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