Road work funding law is questioned

ATLANTA --- A tight road construction budget is prompting the state Department of Transportation to question a law aimed at ensuring that areas outside metro Atlanta get their share of the funding.

At issue is a policy known as "congressional balancing," which requires the department to divide 80 percent of its highway funding evenly among the state's 13 congressional districts. DOT Commissioner Gena Evans and others argue that the state law distorts state transportation spending by directing it away from priorities, such as easing congestion in metro Atlanta.

"It's clearly not working," Ms. Evans said Thursday during a meeting of the DOT board. "It's clearly bad policy."

Part of the problem with the law, critics say, is its nearly constant flux since first being enacted in 1999. The law has been revised twice, said Earl Mahfuz, the agency's assistant treasurer.

Any wholesale change to congressional balancing would require legislative approval. For now, agency officials are instead trying to find ways to increase Atlanta's share without changing the law.

But some board members from outside the state's largest city are wary of changing the policy. Steve Farrow, a board member from Dalton, pointed out that Atlanta also gets some of the funding given to its congressional districts.