Fred Walser thought he'd gotten all the good news he would get from the state congress this year. The chairman of the U.S. 2 Safety Coalition hadn't expected the road to get much funding this year, as the congress was just halfway through a two-year budget and was only writing a supplementary budget, fine-tuning the planned outlay.
Walser had been warned that money was tight and told not to expect much. So when the House of Representatives found $5 million last month for a new passing lane, he thought the coalition had done pretty well.
When he got a call from a reporter Saturday, March 8, asking him to comment on the senate's decision to add another $5 million to the budget for needed safety improvements to the road, he was stunned. "The reporter said they'd doubled the $5 million to $10 million," said Walser. "It's hugely significant."
Total comes to $14 million
The surprise $5 million brings total new U.S. 2 safety funds this year to about $14 million. About $4 million is a combination of state, federal and county funds earmarked for centerline rumble strips between Monroe and Sultan.
That money had been set aside in 2007 and the project was slated to begin in 2010, but Governor Christine Gregoire requested the Department of Transportation to expedite the project. Now the project will get underway in April.
The $5 million from the House of Representatives was itself a surprise, said Walser. That money had been allocated following an exhaustive examination of the budget to identify funds that had become available since the budget was passed in 2007.
It was soon designated for a new passing lane just west of Sultan, a place not known for fatal accidents, but that is the scene of a high number of less serious accidents. And there was included money for six new state troopers to come to the Monroe State Patrol Office and work exclusively on U.S. 2, which they will do beginning this summer.
But the $5 million from the Senate seemed to have come out of the blue. In reality, the money was carefully pruned from older budgets, said Senate Transportation Committee Chair Mary Margaret Haugen. "We made some reductions in other areas and we found some savings," she said. Some road projects have come in under budget, she noted. And her staff was able to identify ways to do some other scheduled projects more cheaply, she said.
Funding result of years of effort
It wasn't easy getting this money, said Walser. There were many steps involved. The first was to get a study done, and even that seemed nearly impossible once.
"Years ago, when we visited the federal government to get funding, they said 'what are your projects?'" said Donnetta Walser, Mayor of Monroe and wife of Fred Walser. "We didn't know. We didn't have a plan."
Just making a plan required more money than U.S 2 safety advocates had. But then U.S. Representative Rick Larsen, (D-2), shook some federal funding loose, winning $500,000 for a safety study. The state kicked in another $600,000 and local organizations donated $100,000 more to pay for a route development plan. Finished last year, it identified 52 projects needed to improve safety on the road.
The study opened doors for funding, said Donnetta Walser. "Without that, we'd be dead in the water," she said. Then legislators were impressed with highly emotional testimony from area residents, many of whom have lost loved ones on the road, which has claimed 47 lives since 1999, an average of one person every two and a half months.
Gregoire visited in September and met with survivors. Then members of the House Transportation Committee toured the road by bus, passing activists holding memorials at the sites of fatal crashes. The legislators stopped the bus and spoke to several demonstrators.
Then, earlier this year, area residents including Tom Cock, the father of 17-year-old Thomas Turner, killed in December while returning from Stevens Pass Ski Resort, testified before the transportation committee.
Many legislators, including Dan Kristiansen and Kirk Pearson, also worked to bring attention to the need on U.S. 2, said Walser. The combination of the plan and the contact with legislators seems to be having an impact, said Fred Walser.
"We got just an amazing reception out of the House and Senate," he said.
Community asked to help spend the money
One of the most surprising elements of the revised budget was a provision that the U.S. Safety Coalition be involved in deciding how best to use the money. "We didn't lock the project up (on any one thing) because we wanted locals to have input on where the money should be best invested," said Haugen.
Now it's time for the community to help the Safety Coalition figure out how to spend the money. There will be a public meeting on Monday, March 24 at 7 p.m. at the Monroe Library.
Walser said that with $10 million to work with instead of $5 million, the community could consider the possibility of choosing not to do the passing lane, but focusing perhaps on one more expensive project, such as improving the intersection of Fern Bluff Road and U.S. 2, where there have been four fatal crashes.
Much more is needed
As welcome as the $14 million is, it only represents a tiny fraction of what is needed on U.S. 2, said Fred Walser. "We need $2 billion to do all of U.S. 2 right and four-lane it," he said.
As a major east-west corridor, making the highway four lanes and separating east- and west-bound traffic is important not only for safety but for the state's economy, he said.
But finding that kind of money won't be easy, said Haugen. "I don't see the legislature raising taxes in the future," she said. "There's not a lot of will. And that's not the only obstacle to making the highway four lanes, she added. "It's going to be a challenge to make it a full four-lane highway," she said. "There's railroad tracks on one side and a river on the other. It's pretty narrow."
The federal government needs to contribute, said Fred Walser. "Minot, N.D., just got $100 million from the federal government to four-lane the part of U.S. 2 that goes through their area," he said. "We should be getting exactly that same kind of attention."
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