Buoyed by reports of public support, the Regional Transportation District is said to be considering going back to the ballot for another tax hike for funds to complete the stalled FasTracks. However, there are good reasons to believe that, this time, voters might tell RTD "Not so fast."

It was just in 2004 that voters generously approved a hefty sales tax hike to support the ambitious build-out of light rail. But mounting costs have crippled the plan and now RTD is looking for salvation at the ballot box.

The public has supported adding transit to the metro transportation mix and the light-rail lines completed so far have proved popular. But public support for transportation in theory might not translate to the reality of another tax hike.

Although polls often show public willingness to raise sales taxes, a smart opposition campaign will challenge RTD management's credibility to deliver a rail program, even with millions more. RTD's track record hasn't been seriously challenged and it is vulnerable to the charge of promising too much in the 2004 election and delivering too little since.

A smart campaign that year sold the plan to voters, but after it passed, construction cost projections became unrealistic, even to RTD. While the estimates were recognized as unrealistic as early as 2005, the problem was exacerbated by commodity inflation in 2007 and 2008. The knockout blow was the collapse of sales tax revenue triggered by the recession in late 2008.

Many factors make a tax increase today a risky proposition and suggest a need for an alternative solution.

* Voters are reluctant to raise taxes when their incomes are declining and jobs are endangered. They said no to a host of state and local tax initiatives last fall just as the economy began its free fall. Today, things are much worse, and most knowledgeable observers believe it will continue to decline throughout 2009.

* More important, a tax increase in this recessionary period will have a negative economic impact. For each tenth-of-a-cent sales tax increase requested, approximately $40 million would be withdrawn from the retail and general economy and moved into government coffers - not to be spent until 2012 or later.

* Voters raised RTD's tax level and revenue 66 percent in 2004. Now the district is promoting another 40 percent increase. Its projections were off by 36 percent, or $2.1 billion short of the $7.9 billion it now claims to need. Without some change in management and an independent agency review, any campaigning for an increased sales tax would be heavily burdened by RTD's poor reputation for accurate projections.

What the public made clear by its voting and polling responses is that it wants the program it was promised, and it wants it sooner rather than later. The smart move for RTD would move the "shovel ready" projects forward and not request more money now.

If a regional sales tax increase is required, it should not be contemplated until beyond 2010 when the recession abates, and if a four-tenths-of-a-cent increase is proposed, it should be dedicated equally to transit and highways.

The multibillion-dollar investment of funds to transit at the same time that highway funding is being scuttled by the recession is creating a distortion between real on-the-ground transportation needs (automobiles and trucks will continue to make up 85 percent of the metro area's transportation system's trips) and funding.

Polling and recent elections show that metro voters are supportive of local highway transportation funding strategies. For example, Adams and Douglas counties have recently had successful sales tax extension elections for roads and transportation improvements, and improving transportation infrastructure was one of the elements in Denver's successful 2006 bond package.

This alternative funding plan would have the benefit of employing sound macroeconomic policy (i.e., not raising taxes during a recession), and striking a balance between needed highway and transit funding and good politics.

Floyd Ciruli, founder of Ciruli Associates, is a Denver-based pollster and political analyst for 9News and KOA Radio.