"On behalf of King County, thank you for the opportunity to provide our comments on the board’s efforts to improve our region’s transportation system.

I would also like to thank the staff from the three partner counties and those cities in King County who have contributed greatly to the work being done to improve our transportation system – including the Washington State Department of Transportation. Its work has contributed to regional discussion and decision-making on many fronts, including the development of the CVEP process, which has given us an additional effective tool for evaluating the cost of proposed projects.

I am here today at the request of Executive Sims. He has been out talking to constituencies from business to environmental leaders as well as the public, and, with their input, has tasked our Department of Transportation with taking a new look at the projects that have been discussed here.

  We are concerned that the process, as it has played out so far, is leading us toward stalemate and not toward a viable package that provides realistic solutions to transportation problems.

  We need a package that the voters will embrace.

  Our challenge is to bring a fresh perspective and outlook to the planning process.

Just as regional leaders came together and forged a compromise over the I-90 project last month, we need a similar compromise as we work to finalize the RTID package. Where would this region be today had there not been compromise and the desire to move ahead to build this vital east-west transportation corridor? And we can look to the future, knowing additional improvements will be made that will deliver even more access and people carrying capacity in this vital corridor. We need to replicate this cooperation and be willing to evaluate all potential projects against a set of performance criteria that offer the voters a strategic package of effective transportation investments.

Our task is to refine and apply consistent criteria to the proposed package to determine which projects will actually deliver the most in terms of moving people and goods.

It is imperative that we demonstrate the value of the investment we will be asking people to make. We must show our citizens that specific projects on this list will solve specific problems at a price people can afford and that these projects are achievable.

To that end, we are currently analyzing each RTID investment being proposed for King County according to set, standardized criteria that will be refined and then shared with the region. The executive will then recommend, in September, a project list that reflects these criteria and tests all modes of transportation investments.

These criteria will be shared with the region before the final project list is proposed.

This review will be performed with no preconceived notion as to what will make the list. We will apply the same screen to all projects the RTID members have discussed to see what makes the most sense.

We need to use guiding principles to help us make choices on projects being proposed for inclusion in the RTID package. For King County, these principles focus on elements such as safety and preservation of existing roads, freight mobility, growth management, and projects that have the greatest potential for moving the most people and goods.

The list will reflect a careful examination of what each project will deliver that is achievable and a wise investment. The project list will likely be considerably smaller than the list now being proposed as a result of this process.

For example, funding constraints may not allow the RTID to fully fund a project. But with standard criteria giving us a more clear picture, we may decide, just as the I-405 Steering Committee has done, that it is better to segment projects.

Given the current economy, we owe it to families to demonstrate that we understand the fiscal impact of these decisions. The first and most important concern is that the current $14 billion package of investments being proposed is simply too big, given the availability of current revenues and the amount of money we can realistically expect to raise in the short term.

There are some factors contributing to this concern.

  First, many of the projects in the larger RTID list are not ready to go and the voters will not see progress on them for years. It might be better to come back to the voters for additional taxing authority when these projects are further along in the planning process;

  Second, voters are unlikely to approve a package of taxes at the levels being discussed, even if the improvements contained in the package are good and valuable additions to the transportation network.

To that end, the executive will also recommend a less regressive funding strategy than one predicated solely on the current sales tax increase - one that includes combinations of user fees in the mix.