The Seattle Post-Intelligencer today editorializes that "Silence Kills." The paper asserts that city, regional and state politicians have been WAY too quiet on Initiative 912, which if approved by voters in November, would roll back the gas tax hike the state legislature OK'd last spring. Pols should be leading a loud parade to convince the public I-912 is a bad idea, the P-I opines. Tip to P-I editorial writers: when your paper shuts down, don't look for work as political consultants.
P-I columnist Joel Connelly was much closer to a winning transportation tax strategy in his column earlier this week.
Read on, below the fold. (Mac Safari users must click on time stamp to continue).
Connelly wrote about a forum held last week in Seattle where leaders of successful public campaigns offered lessons directly rebutting the P-I ed board's proven-disastrous "old school" approach.
...Denver and San Diego, have persuaded voters to tax themselves to pay for better highways and expanded mass transit. "Politicians were not our best messengers, which was hard for them to come to grips with," said Erik Bruvold, campaign manager for Proposition A, a $9.5 billion highway and transit program approved by San Diego area voters.What happened here? Supporters sent out Gov. Gary Locke and ex-Sen. Slade Gorton to stump the state for Referendum 51, the last gas tax increase. Former Gov. Dan Evans has lately decried the "selfishness" of today's voters.
Instead, San Diego stressed the central message of relieving congestion. "Congestion was equated with desperation: Desperation was our friend," joked Bruvold. Civic entrepreneurs were recruited to speak up for transportation, and to serve as "kindergarten monitors" of recalcitrant interest groups. The package itself was balanced, combining expansion of four interstate highways with more frequent and extensive transit service.
The campaign for a $4.7 billion transportation plan in Denver began about 15 months in advance of the vote. "Early planning, early TV, early voter contact," explained Greg Kolomitz, campaign co-chairman of Yes on FasTracks. Kolomitz has come on board here as an adviser to the anti-912 effort, which has all of eight weeks to get its act together.
I-912 opponents are not able to explain how the new gas tax hike will reduce congestion because it won't. Like I-912 opponents and backers, I want the Alaskan Way Viaduct and the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge (a.k.a the Route 520 bridge) made safe, but I also want congestion eased. I also want to know - if by some chance the gas tax hike is NOT rejected by voters - just where will the additional $1.2 billion (in the no-tunnel scenario) come from for the Viaduct? or the additional $2.2 billion for the tunnel option? And from where will spring the additional billions for the 520 bridge? No emphasis on these questions is evident, however.
Holistic planning for the region is at present a well-intentioned fantasy. Due to re-election concerns, the "leadership" has a timid, one-painful-bite-at-a-time approach to selling road and transit improvement essential to future population and economic growth in Central Puget Sound (Pierce, Snohomish and King counties). That same queasy mindset has foreclosed recruitment of folks who are "not the usual suspects," to sell a comprehensive, congestion-cutting transportation plan for the region. Of course, the afore-noted absence of such a plan to begin with, is a rather large stumbling block.
On the flip-side, while I-912's zealous supporters have many legitimate criticisms of the gas tax hike, they will also have a responsibility to be constructive, going forward. If, as seems likely, I-912 does pass, and the gas tax hike is rolled back, I will look forward to thoughtful input from the initiative's leading backers as to just exactly what a good regional transportation plan WOULD look like. Including not only congestion-reduction assessment tools, organizational reforms, and transit components, but palatable funding sources, as well.
Put another way, you can only piss and moan for so long, folks.
Posted by Matt Rosenberg at September 14, 2005 09:21 AM | Email This
http://www.leg.wa.gov/RCW/index.cfm?section=42.17.130&fuseaction=section
RCW 42.17.130
Forbids use of public office or agency facilities in campaigns.
No elective official nor any employee of his office nor any person appointed to or employed by any public office or agency may use or authorize the use of any of the facilities of a public office or agency, directly or indirectly, for the purpose of assisting a campaign for election of any person to any office or for the promotion of or opposition to any ballot proposition. Facilities of public office or agency include, but are not limited to, use of stationery, postage, machines, and equipment, use of employees of the office or agency during working hours, vehicles, office space, publications of the office or agency, and clientele lists of persons served by the office or agency: PROVIDED, That the foregoing provisions of this section shall not apply to the following activities:
(1) Action taken at an open public meeting by members of an elected legislative body to express a collective decision, or to actually vote upon a motion, proposal, resolution, order, or ordinance, or to support or oppose a ballot proposition so long as (a) any required notice of the meeting includes the title and number of the ballot proposition, and (b) members of the legislative body or members of the public are afforded an approximately equal opportunity for the expression of an opposing view;
(2) A statement by an elected official in support of or in opposition to any ballot proposition at an open press conference or in response to a specific inquiry;
(3) Activities which are part of the normal and regular conduct of the office or agency.
Posted by: jason on September 14, 2005 09:52 AMVery easy.
WE WANT OUR MONEY'S WORTH.
-Full frontal assault on prevailing wage rules, which increase construction costs 5-20% solely at the benefit of a very small but loud politically active minority.
-Dump HOV lanes, light rail, monorail, Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy etc mumbo jumbo that focuses on the 15%,and criminalize the 85% who, by necessity, cannot use HOV, buses, light rail....
-Defund WSDOT and create a new agency, with an elected administrator, staffed with adults who can actually think in a critical ans strategic way. WSDOT has been stuffed, for 20 yrs, with nutball social planners who are intent on punishing commuters and forcing us into carpools, buses, light rail etc.
WSDOT is terminally brain dead-pull the plug.
We will give Olympia some money when we GET OUR MONEY'S WORTH.
Not a red cent until then.........Queen Christine
Posted by: THS on September 14, 2005 10:01 AMWho was the braniac who thought up this scheme?
Posted by: keyser on September 14, 2005 10:09 AMBy the way, great article!
Posted by: C. Oh on September 14, 2005 10:20 AMBTW, I would like to see the gas tax increase at $1 if we can be assured it wouldn't result in huge price increases in construction.
Posted by: swatter on September 14, 2005 10:27 AMIn Oklahoma, voters overwhelmingly defeated a nickel-a-gallon increase in the price of gas to raise money for road and bridge repairs.
Just thought you might like to know..
Posted by: Colin on September 14, 2005 11:01 AMThe billions for the viaduct and the bridge must be matched by residents in three counties, but I want to know what happens to those billions if the voters fail to tax themselves to come up with the matching state funds.
I want congestion to go away and I want to know how Seattle will evacuate all of the car-less residents when the big one hits, without warning, but of course the moonbats will claim the President should have known it was coming!
In my area around Lacey, they have built quite a few new roads, and lots of round-abouts, but the emphasis is always on the pretty, instead of capability. On several streets, the congestion is actually worse than before they started the constuction.
Where our post office is, they tore up the parking lot which had diagonal parking spaces. They changed the direction of the spaces, made the parking spaces straight, while adding landscape areas in between every row of spaces.
The result is a nightmare. You can't park and walk into any of the businesses. You have to park and walk around all of the landscape areas. It was done because our city planner demanded it for stormwater runoff. If you are a Post Office customer - you will carry your packages 4 times further than before.
Posted by: sgmmac on September 14, 2005 11:12 AM
I know we need to pay for imrovements and I am willing to pay for those imporvements, just as soon as I see the money being spent productively (forget the bicycle lanes no matter how good it makes you feel) and fairly - we put tolls on the new Narrows bridge, why aren't tolls being put on the new 520 bridge and the Alaskan Way Viaduct?
Posted by: Jay on September 14, 2005 11:19 AMAn interesting comparison here...Denver proposes a transportation package to their voters. They apparently had a specific plan, introduced it to the public, and for 15 months informed and campaigned until it was passed. Washington on the other hand (while citizens are still stunned by election irregularities), attacks our already heavily taxed wallet with 96 emergency spending bills (instead of meaningful election reform), and signed by a contested governor with a 38% approval rating. Then stand around stunned and angry when voters ask to vote on even one of the emergency spending bills they rammed through under false pretenses.
Washingtons transportation package is not project specific, only partially funded, and offensively labeled "emergency." There are ligitimate transportation needs in KC and Washington, but the tyrannical manner in which this bill (& 95 others) was passed, along with the open slush fund wording, made it an easy target for citizen dissatisfaction.
And MSM doesn't understand the difference, while continuing their mindless partisan drival. Investigative reporting by MSM is almost dead, but they whine about loosing readers. Like the French, they have made themselves irrelevent.
Posted by: dl on September 14, 2005 12:25 PM"(O)ut of frustration, I went and hired transportation engineers simply for my own mental health. I wanted to know if there is a better solution, something better we could do. I hired some internationally recognized people to study Puget Sound, which is where 80 percent of the congestion in the state is. These engineers came back with some very simple information: More than 50 percent of trips are occurring on our freeway system, which is about 5 percent of our road system; another 15 percent of trips take place on the major arterials in the region, about 7 percent of our road system. Taken altogether, only 12 percent of our road system is carrying two-thirds of our trips.
Transit, though it has grown twice as fast as the national average, still carries only 2.8 percent of all trips."
Q: If less than 3 percent of our people are riding mass transit, why are we spending so much money on it?
A: It starts off as an emotional, religious experience, the blind faith people have in transit......
MUCH more:
http://www.awb.org/cgi-bin/absolutenm/templates/?a=986&z=3
You want one that will pass?
Get rid of prevailing wage.
Get rid of the sales tax shuffle to the general fund.
Get rid of the 1/2 percent art funding requirement.
Get rid of the glad-handing at the county and city level.
ONLY apply the tax increase to concrete related to reducing vehicle congestion and/or freight mobility.
Not one dime for ferries, buses, trains (Light rail or otherwise) or planes.
Unleash Brian Sonntag on the projects.
I'd vote for THIS gas tax if it had these provisions. These are a common-sense response to the areas of greatest objection to the debacle of our government ramming an idiotic tax at the worst possible time down our collective throats.
Dont leave out: not one dime for bike lanes.
Close WSDOT, contract out all transportation functions to private enterprise; buyouts based on past performance for then former WSDOT employees----$20 each. And that's generous, based on past performance.
Posted by: THS on September 14, 2005 03:51 PMPut another way, you can only p*ss and moan for so long, folks.
I-912 supporters need to tell the public NOW what they propose - not after the vote. You're asking people to vote against raising $5.5 billion in needed funds, so you better tell them what should be built instead and how much that will cost, and that it will likely cost over $5.5 billion anyway, regardless.
BTW - don't tell me the plans for 520 won't reduce congestion. All indications are they will, by adding more lanes. Oh, and as for paying for the additional cost, they're planning automated toll collection.
As for the Alaskan Way Viaduct - news flash: we can reduce congestion, but we also have an obligation to keep our roads safe. The AWV is a disaster waiting to happen. of course we could just wait for an earthquake to pancake the structure and kill people in the process. Seems to be the Republican approach to funding critical infrastructure needs. You gamble that you don't get a Katrina event - but you cannot afford to gamble and be wrong.
Posted by: Daniel K on September 14, 2005 08:38 PMTHS - that's a quote from Matt Rosenberg. For some reason the comment software messes up markup when a paragraph break is involve.
Tell me what which of the 270 projects funded by the bill are not based on realities? Spending reforms are fine, but we have infrastructure that needs to be maintained, and has been severely neglected due to spending reforms. Which environmental protections are you ready to dismiss?
Oh, and BTW, unlike WalMart, you can't poor concrete in Washington state from China, not that there is anything at WalMart I don't prefer buying elsewhere.
Posted by: Daniel K on September 14, 2005 09:28 PM
We have a DOT that actively dislikes highways, staffed by overeducated fascists. Of course, they're too clever by half...they want to impose a world view and transportation system that only makes sense if you can see the Space Needle from your house.
We've been told that we "know" that we can't build our way out of congestion; the past twenty years has "proved" that. Of course, we haven't tried, so I guess I'm supposed to take it on faith.
Transportation policy for the last 25 years has been based upon falsehood. This $8B tax package is more of the same. Anti-highway advocates, P-I columnists and state DOT spokesman have lost all credibility. It really doesn't matter what you have to say, because no serious person is listening anymore.
We could eliminate all the expensive detention systems that sit empty and replace them with flow attenuators and streambank stabilization projects.
We can start designing the improvements to last 20 years instead of having to start over just after the original project is completed- ala 405 at Bothell.
We can get the materials that we use to pave be able to stand up to the megatrucks that use the lanes. It is not my Focus that is causing ruts like logging road ruts on I5.
We can eliminate the idea that salmon are endangered. Of course, they taste better now that they are endangered.
We can get the WDOT in the highway business doing designs instead of farming the designs out to the rich and famous meganational engineering firms.
All in all, that will only save 15 or so percent of the budget. So, we do need more money to plan ahead. In the old days, it was a good job to be in the highway department. They had good people; now those people are in other sectors of the engineering community. We need to get good planning into the WDOT.
And this obsession with transit? Well, that is for another day.
Posted by: swatter on September 15, 2005 08:44 AMNone of the costs for any of those 270 items are fixed, and we know what ST and SMP did with their budgets once they got hooked up to their "transportation" tax flows. There is no date when the gas tax would stop, there is no limit on how much anyone would pay of that increased tax. Those revenues would not even go to the really significant Seattle-area upgrades unless a new taxing agency (RTID) with open-ended MVET tax powers wins in Nov. 2006. On this last point, voters who live under ST and SMP might find yet another appointed, unrepresentative and unaccountable local government over them a prospect too gristly to swallow.
I-912 deserves a yes vote because the cabal running the trasportation regime can't handle the financial aspects of it smartly.
Posted by: respu on September 15, 2005 08:54 AMI'm not saying this should be done at the expense of roads (I used to drive from West Seattle to Totem Lake) but why does any decision have to be all one and not the other.
Not disagreeing with many of the points about I-912, but I don't see why the voices of transit users can't be heard in any new transporation plan.
Posted by: Walt on September 15, 2005 11:00 AMDaniel K...I-912 supporters do not need to develop a "good regional transportation plan." That is the job of State and Local Leadership, they are elected and/or paid to develop these plans. They voluntarily accepted their position of leadership. By supporting I-912 we are merely telling them we do not like their current plan, and that they need to go back to the drawing board and develop a better one. Their job would be easier if they had better listening skills and attempted to understand responsible budgeting.
Posted by: dl on September 15, 2005 01:41 PMWe're so hamstrung by process we can no longer build cost effective infrastructure of any kind. We need to cut red tape, get rid of prevailing wage, and build some dang roads. I drive to work at 5:30 in the morning just to avoid the traffic, and have you ever noticed how good the traffic is on holidays when government is shut down? Maybe government could help reduce congestion by staggering the start times of the bureaucrats.
More importantly, the gas tax increase does very little to fund transit. I could whole-heartedly support a 20 or 30 cent/gallon gas tax increase if most of the money went into transit systems, not highways that are worse than useless in solving our transportation problems.
The money from the gas tax increase is grouped into projects as follows (numbers from WSDOT, comments are my own):
Roadway Safety: $3.257 billion - includes partial funding for AWV replacement and SR-520 expansion, which are both collosal wastes of money. Assuming everything else is actually for safety projects, $757 million of this is spending I can support.
Preservation: $0.5 million
Ferries: $185 million - none of this is for passenger ferries, which is a mistake
Multi-Modal Improvements: $85 million - grossly underfunded
Environmental: $108 million - sound walls and the like. Might not all be necessary if we took actions to cut automobile dependancy
Freight Mobility & Economics: $541 million
Choke Points and Congestion: $2.952 billion - this is code for building more freeway lanes and ramps, and is a collosal waste of money to destroy quality of life
Taking the last item plus the $2 billion for AWV replacement plus $500 million for SR-520 expansion yields a total of $5.452 billion (out of $7.139 billion) worth of projects that are worse than useless, and that actively contribute to worsening urban sprawl and congestion in the state.
I would vote against I-912 if the gas tax increase were about safety and improving Washington's quality of life. Unfortunately, it is mostly about building more roads to encourage ever increasing sprawl.
Vote YES on I-912.
Posted by: Roy Smith on October 17, 2005 02:25 PM