Bait and switch: Inslee gives highway projects funds to fish

 

Last updated 1/7/2021 at 10am



OLYMPIA – Governor Jay Inslee’s 2021-23 proposed state transportation budget calls for a shift of hundreds of millions of dollars in transportation funding to pay for court-ordered fish passage projects.

A 2013 U.S. District Court injunction requires the state to significantly increase the effort for removing state-owned culverts that block habitat for salmon and steelhead by 2030.

“Drivers have the right to be upset by Inslee’s proposed shift of highway-project funding,” Senator Mark Schoesler of Ritzville said.

Schoesler said when he joined about two-thirds of the Legislature in passing the Connecting Washington transportation package in 2015, they did so despite its inclusion of a large gas-tax increase.

“We voted for that package mainly because it would fund needed highway projects throughout the state, including some in my district. I’m opposed to the governor’s new transportation plan because it might delay several road projects that have either just started or are slated to begin soon.”

Schoesler pointed out that Washington drivers are paying a higher gas tax, under the impression that the money raised by it will help pay for road projects in their area, not for fish-culvert projects.

“There’s no way I would have voted for such a large gas-tax hike in 2015, if I knew that any projects funded by this package would be delayed or taken away years later to pay for fish passage,” Schoesler said, adding the governor hasn’t specified which projects would be delayed or modified.

“It concerns me that we won’t know until well into our 2021 session which projects might be placed on hold,” Schoesler said.

He said the governor’s budget plan would take reductions from Connecting Washington projects to cover about $1 billion in both preservation and fish culvert projects.

“The reductions allowing this shift would come from delaying or modifying projects into future years where possible,” Schoesler said. “It appears there is $586 million in spending planned on future Connecting Washington road projects. If the governor’s transportation budget becomes reality and the fish-barrier projects end up taking $724 million of this $1 billion shift, it would leave a very significant and costly funding gap.”

Inslee did not respond to phone calls or emails from the Journal before this article went to press.

 

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