Photo by Steven Allen Adams West Virginia Transportation Secretary Tom Smith discusses maintenance issues with the state Senate’s Transportation Committee.

CHARLESTON — West Virginia Transportation Secretary Tom Smith told a Senate committee this week that his office has yet to make a decision regarding Gov. Jim Justice’s proposal to take road bond money meant for major projects and divert it to fix secondary roads.

Smith, speaking to the Senate Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said the governor continues to receive complaints over the condition of West Virginia’s secondary roads.

The governor “has heard people throughout West Virginia say you haven’t taken as much care of the secondary roads system as we’d like you to,” Smith said. “He’s really pressed us to find ways to take care of that and do more for the secondary system. We are working on options with his office and have not yet come to conclusions on that.”

During his Jan. 9 State of the State address, Justice proposed taking funds from the Roads to Prosperity program for use in repairing secondary roads.

Smith said the department is looking at multiple ways to increase funding for secondary road maintenance.

“It’s premature for me to say that is the direction we’re going. We just haven’t concluded that yet,” Smith said.

Committee Chairman Sen. Charles Clements, R-Wetzel, a former executive director of the W.Va. 2 and I-68 Authority, said he was concerned the governor or transportation officials might downgrade projects that were promised in the road bond.

“I’ve heard so much talk about taking money from the road bond to use for routine maintenance,” Clements said. “When the governor proposed this road bond and we went out and sold the road bond to the public, there was a list of projects on there. We knew there probably wasn’t enough (money) to complete all of them, but by us taking money out of the road bond on issues of routine maintenance, are we not shortening that list?”

The Roads to Prosperity Amendment passed with 73 percent support during a special election in October 2017. It gave the Legislature authority to sell up to $1.6 billion in general obligation bonds for major road and bridge projects.

Sen. Bob Plymale, D-Wayne, said he also encouraged his constituents to support the bond issue.

He said reducing any of the road bond projects would cause problems in the future.

“The biggest concern I have in the district I represent are the projects that I helped sell to the public — I think — could be on this chopping block,” Plymale said. “I’m really concerned with that, because then what I’ve done is a disservice to my constituents. These roads are supposed to be on it and I’m afraid they won’t be. That concerns me.”

Citing a 2015 report from the Blue Ribbon Commission on Highways created by former Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, Smith said the report called for $1.3 billion annually for road projects, including $750 million for road maintenance. Starting in 2013, when the commission first formed, to this year, the state is $4.5 billion behind in deferred maintenance.