Article by Erik Smith. Published on Wednesday, July 20, 2011 EST.
Broad Coalition Forming Against Eyman’s I-1125 – Reminiscent of Gas-Tax Campaign in 2005
By Erik Smith
Staff writer/ Washington State Wire
OLYMPIA, July 20.—You don’t often see business, labor and environmentalists agreeing on anything, but if there’s one thing that can bring them together, it’s opposition to Tim Eyman’s anti-toll ballot measure.
They’re making common cause in their campaign against Initiative I-1125, calling their effort Keep Washington Rolling – a nod to the similar campaign they mounted against a gas-tax rollback measure in 2005, which used the same name. They unfurled it with a press announcement Tuesday. On board so far is the Washington Roundtable, the Washington State Labor Council, the Washington Transportation Choices Coalition, and Futurewise, an environmental land-use coalition.
But there will be others, opponents say. And it’ll be big. “I think you’re going to see a very broad coalition rise up around this,” said consultant Sandeep Kaushik. “There is certainly a lot of concern in the business community as wall as the environmental community and among labor groups about the far-reaching negative implications of I-1125. I think you’ll see a coalition very much like the coalition that came together to oppose I-912 back in 2005.”
The measure, which turned in signatures to the state elections office July 8 and appears almost certain to make the fall ballot, would impose tight restrictions on the use of tolls for road projects. Among other things, it would require that tolls be used only for the projects where the money is collected. That’s an attack on “system tolling” proposals which are being contemplated as a way to pay for major road improvements in the greater Seattle area, most notably a plan to place tolls on the I-90 bridge across Lake Washington in order to pay for improvements to the Evergreen Point Bridge a few miles north.
Other proposals have been surfacing of late – including a plan to toll the I-5 express lanes through Seattle – and it might be seen as the emergence of a new philosophy with regard to tolling. The idea being that it makes sense to impose tolls on projects completed decades ago in order to pay for other road improvements elsewhere in the regional highway system.
What the measure really does is to force the public to take a stand.
Initial Coalition Members Announced
It’s not that the formation of an opposition campaign comes as a surprise. But in their announcement Tuesday some of the biggest players identify themselves. This won’t be the full list. Campaign spokeswoman Cynara Lilly said some of the greater Seattle area’s biggest corporate players are expected to announce their opposition in coming weeks. The announcement mainly gives a sense of the breadth of the opposition. Doug McDonald, former secretary of the state Department of Transportation, is expected to play a major role in the campaign.
“I-1125 is a new attack on transportation and transit projects in Washington state,” said Steve Mullin, president and CEO of the Washington Roundtable, an association of the state’s largest employers. “That business, labor, environmentalists and community leaders from around the state are standing together to oppose this effort in a nearly unprecedented coalition speaks volumes about just how much harm I-1125 would do to our economy and quality of life in Washington state.
“This initiative isn’t about solving a problem. It’s funded by a small handful of people and will undermine our ability to make progress on our state’s pressing transportation challenges.”
The effort is just getting under way. In the Public Disclosure Commission reports filed July 10, the no-on-1125 campaign reported total fundraising during June of exactly zero. But that will change by the time the next reports are due Aug. 10.
Meanwhile, initiative promoter Eyman reported fundraising of $1.28 million. It spent about $1.1 million collecting signatures to get to the ballot.
Freeman is Biggest Backer
Biggest backer of Initiative 1125 is Bellevue developer Kemper Freeman, developer of Bellevue Square and other major downtown-area properties, who sees the tolling proposals as a threat to the free flow of traffic between Seattle and Bellevue. The measure would bar the use of the I-90 bridge for light rail – another longtime Freeman cause. Freeman has contributed over $1 million to the campaign.
Freeman said July 10, “Citizens are rightly suspicious of tolls because of a valid concern that Olympia will raid revenues during ’emergencies.’ That’s why I-1125’s policies requiring accountability and transparency are so necessary. Tolls aren’t taxes and I-1125 keeps it that way.”
The measure also would bar variable toll rates, which are used on Highway 167 in the Green River Valley, and are contemplated for the planned Seattle waterfront tunnel. It would require legislative approval for tolls, rather than leaving the matter in the hands of the appointed state transportation commission.
In a statement released Tuesday, Eyman said, “In this extremely tough economy, taxpayers are hard pressed to pay for their existing tax burdens. The idea of unelected bureaucrats forcing families to pay thousands of dollars a year for ‘anything goes’ tolls – tolls imposed on anyone and spent on anything – is never going to fly with the public. Voters rejected a state income tax – ‘anything goes’ tolls would be even worse.”
Tolls the Future?
The opposition campaign maintains that tolling may be the best way to finance major new transportation projects. The state traditionally has relied on gas-tax revenue for road construction, making the mechanism as clear-cut a user fee imaginable. A 1944 amendment to the state constitution put a lockbox around the money, protecting it from grasping legislatures – the 18th amendment prohibits the use of gas tax revenues for anything but highways and ferries. And so the system worked with great reliability until recent decades. But as cars have become more fuel efficient, lawmakers have been forced to increase gas taxes every few years, and now the development of alternative-fuel vehicles threatens to overturn the applecart.
Though it is largely a Seattle-area issue, opponents say it might also have implications for tolling in the Vancouver area, where toll revenue might be used to replace the aging Interstate Bridge on Interstate 5. Tolling of the nearby I-405 bridge on the Columbia River is a possibility.
Making Common Cause
Each of the interest groups has their own reason for joining the opposition campaign. For business groups, traffic congestion threatens to strangle economic growth. For the unions, lack of money threatens construction jobs. For the environmentalists – that’s an interesting one. In the city of Seattle, many greens are opposing the most significant new highway construction project, the waterfront tunnel. They contend that if the Alaskan Way Viaduct comes down and nothing takes its place, the massive traffic congestion that will result might convince more people to take the bus and light rail. But the Futurewise organization, formerly known as 1000 Friends of Washington, is arguing for smart transportation planning and new construction. “If I-1125 passes, it will have widespread implications, not just on our environment, but on our quality of life and our ability to do business,” said director April Putney.
Tuesday’s announcement contained other statements from major opposition players:
* Jeff Johnson, president of the Washington State Labor Council: “In these tough economic times, we need to be creating jobs, not introducing policy that would eliminate jobs and threaten economic growth for our businesses, workers and our communities.”
* Rob Johnson, executive director of the Transportation Choices Coalition: “Transportation is about getting from Point A to Point B – where we live, to where we work, to where we play – and I-1125 would effectively kill Washington’s options for improving transportation. It would be especially devastating for families that are worries about the rising price of gas and depend on buses, rail and other means to move around our region.”Your support matters.
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