New Financials Problems At DOT: "People will be on their hands and knees thanking God Almighty it (the proposed T-SPLOST) wasn’t on the ballot.”

I confess to not being very disappointed about the T-SPLOST vote on the last day of the legislative session. I say this as a major booster of transportation, and one who recognizes how much our transportation needs are now.

As urgent as our transportation needs are, we need to get a handle on where we are with respect to where things are now. DOT Commissioner Gena Abraham is working on this, but it is going to take longer.

I think that when we do get a handle on things -- which is going to include some bad news with respect to projects in the Other Georgia not going forward for lack of finances -- we can come up with a plan that most everyone can buy into.

Today Dick Pettys has a column in InsiderAdvantage Georgia today entitled "Look For Revelations Of New Financial Management Problems At DOT." He reports:

[Sen. Eric] Johnson said it may be a good thing the Legislature couldn’t agree on a local option sales tax for transportation, which failed by three votes in the Senate on the session’s final night last Friday.

“I think there’s more bad news to come out of DOT. People will be on their hands and knees thanking God Almighty it (the proposed T-SPLOST) wasn’t on the ballot,” he said. He did not elaborate.