When Issaquah city officials met with their state lawmakers Monday for breakfast, Mayor Fred Butler asked everyone present what headline they would like to see at the end of the 2015 legislative session.
“Just about everyone present picked transportation as the headline they would like to see,” Butler reported at the City Council meeting held late Monday evening.
The city officials held their annual legislative breakfast Monday with four of the six legislators representing the 5th and 41st districts. Lawmakers present included Reps. Judy Clibborn and Tana Senn of the 41st District, as well as Rep. Jay Rodne and Sen. Mark Mullet of the 5th District. The 41st’s Sen. Steve Litzow was absent and the 5th’s Chad Magendanz excused himself early due to illness.
Of course, the truth behind Butler’s headline exercise is more complex: Giving transportation at least a run for its money were solutions for funding and the restoration of state tax distributions to cities; the compromise of medical marijuana with the recreational system warrants an honorable mention.
Revenue share was certainly on Issaquah’s priority list for the session beginning Jan. 12. The state’s contributions to cities have dropped precipitously in recent years — most notably a 50 percent cut in distributions from the liquor excise tax.
“I agree with you guys,” Mullet said at the breakfast. “I think you got a raw deal on revenue share.”
But a transportation package — specifically one that would address rush hour congestion on the city’s slice of Interstate 90 and State Route 900 — was front and center on that list of priorities.
Anyone who’s driven on Front Street knows why: at morning and evening rush hour, traffic on the main downtown arterial regularly slows down to a crawl in both directions, from Sammamish to Hobart.
Issaquah officials are asking for additional eastbound and westbound lanes on I-90; $300,000 in design improvements to the I-90 portion of SR 900 that would allow the area around it to be more bike and pedestrian friendly; and a $2 million state investment in research on the Front Street interchange that could lead to the eventual improvement of the ramps.
The city has also prioritized in its agenda several sources of revenue for transportation — perhaps most significantly lobbying for local governments at the county level and below to be given powers to raise transportation funding.
Clibborn and Mullet said securing transportation funding will be tricky, due to the state’s reliance on the gas tax. Trickier yet, each said, is the fact that the gas tax has been tied up in the repayment of the state Department of Transportation’s bond debts.
“In 2003 to 2005, we bonded our revenue almost completely,” Clibborn said.
In a letter to Gov. Jay Inslee and lawmakers sent Dec. 11 (link goes to documents uploaded by The Seattle Times), State Treasurer Jim McIntire warned that by 2016, 70 percent of gas tax revenues will be paying off WSDOT projects.
The gas tax is so burdened that lawmakers will be considering a controversial “pay-as-you-go” mileage tax on drivers in January. Clibborn said she believed pay-as-you-go would fail this session due to squeamishness, but return as the public became more comfortable with the concept.
Issaquah I-90 improvements also may face competition for money from projects elsewhere in the state.
“There are a bunch of projects (prioritized) in Eastern Washington where they’re not going to vote on a new gas tax,” Mullet said. “And I’m like, ‘screw them!'”
Rodne noted the gas tax was “woefully unpopular” in the 5th District as well.
Issaquah councilmember Joshua Schaer said the regional impact of the city’s I-90 interchange should be put to the fore.
“It’s not just our community (affected), but people who use those interchanges to get to points north and south of here,” Schaer said.
