Last pitch in Measure A campaign

With less than one week until the June 2 election, supporters and opponents of the sales tax proposal known as Measure A are making final pitches to voters.

The five-year, quarter-cent sales tax increase would raise about $20 million annually countywide for general government purposes. Elected officials have said that they will use the funds to fix the county’s ailing 1,383-mile road network and rehabilitate city streets.

Critics have pointed out that the money could technically be spent on anything, since it is proposed as a general tax, requiring a simple majority to pass.

Meanwhile, supporters have injected more than $170,000 into the campaign to pass Measure A. The total includes significant contributions from large North Bay construction companies that would likely compete for road maintenance contracts.

Measure A is the only issue on the ballot in an off-year election that will likely see low voter turnout. Opponents of the measure, who have not been as well funded or organized as supporters, include the Sonoma County Taxpayers Association.

Dan Drummond, executive director of the association, said that voters he has spoken with do not trust elected officials to spend the money on roads.

“Voters are loathe to hand over a big pool of money that has no restrictions on it,” he said. “There is a real mistrust of government out there.”

The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors proposed the tax measure as a way to fund its long-term strategy to fix the road network, which has suffered due to slumping gas tax revenue. Sonoma County’s vast, mostly rural network receives a fraction of the gas tax that larger urban counties receive due to a formula that weights population over road miles.

County leaders, who have pledged to spend the money on roads, say they will contract with the Sonoma County Transportation Authority to ensure that the funding goes toward the intended road maintenance projects.

“We have an opportunity to make a huge generational change in the condition of roads in Sonoma County,” said Supervisor David Rabbitt. “Roads are the number one complaint I hear. This is something we can do to really make a sea change and improve the quality of life and our economic engine.”

Backers of Measure A, including builders and labor unions, have lined up to finance the campaign. Santa Rosa-based Ghilotti Construction Company has spent $26,000 in support of the measure, according to campaign finance documents. Bodean Company, a Santa Rosa asphalt supplier, spent $25,000 and Ghilotti Bros. Contractors of San Rafael spent $15,000.

The California Alliance for Jobs, a Sacramento lobbying group that represents construction companies and union labor, donated $25,000. The Dutra Group, a San Rafael company with plans to build an asphalt plant in Petaluma, donated $10,000 to the campaign.

“There is a lot of vested self-interest in this,” Drummond said. “It’s not surprising who the contributors are.”

Rabbitt said leaders solicited donations from companies that stood to gain from road repair contracts.

“We went after those that will benefit the most and asked them to pay up the most to support the measure,” he said.

Rabbitt said the measure was the best chance of fixing the road network, which is consistently ranked among the worst in the Bay Area.

“I feel we have a moral obligation to step up and leave the next generation with infrastructure that is better than we found it,” he said.

(Contact Matt Brown at matt.brown@arguscou rier.com. On Twitter @MattBrownAC.)