A change in funding from the federal government will postpone highway projects in almost 150 Maine communities.

From a dollars-and-cents perspective, there’s a shortfall in funding of about $130 million that translates into fewer construction projects in Lewiston, Auburn, Poland, Turner and Leeds, just to name a few places.

The news comes just four months after President Bush signed a $286.4 billion transportation bill that will send about $950 million to Maine over six years. While that’s certainly a lot of money, the state had a transportation backlog of about $1 billion before the $130 million in deferments.

Funding for highway projects has not kept up with inflation, and costs have been boosted by international competition for materials.

It’s more of the same on the state and local levels. Needs are outstripping revenues. In November, voters approved a transportation bond of $33 million, and the Legislature is able to raise the state’s gasoline tax, which is the major revenue source for the transportation fund.

On the federal level, the 18.4 cent gasoline tax hasn’t been adjusted since 1993, while its purchasing power has been greatly eroded. A report funded by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce points to the shortfall in federal transportation revenue. It predicts that funding for the transportation bill will be about $50 million less than what the government has agreed to spend.

Raising gas taxes is a thorny political issue. There might be general agreement that a higher tax would prompt more conservation, meaning less pollution, and provide much-needed money for road work, but the current anti-tax climate makes such a move politically dangerous. Even though the Chamber funded the study, it has not endorsed the findings, which suggest indexing the gasoline tax for inflation and developing a miles-traveled tax that would hit hybrid and fuel-efficient vehicles – a bad idea that would undermine the new technologies just as they are beginning to gain traction.

Gov. Baldacci has formed a working group to identify ways to overcome the $130 million gap. A place to start would be to stop the transfer of money from the highway fund to other uses, a crutch the Legislature has used in the past when general fund revenues were running short.

But as Baldacci points out, there’s only so much that can be done without finding more money. “Yankee ingenuity and frugal engineering will be necessary, but by themselves will not be enough to fill the gap.”

It’s a question of matching revenues with priorities. The state’s highways are the linchpin of the economy, but there are many demands on state resources. If the state demands transportation improvements, the choice will likely be higher taxes – in one form or another – or reduced spending in other areas.