1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:01,600 We have to have some sort of lead in. 2 00:00:01,600 --> 00:00:03,040 That's we don't need a lead in. 3 00:00:03,040 --> 00:00:04,240 Yeah, no one. 4 00:00:04,240 --> 00:00:06,800 No one wants to listen to a podcast without a lead in. 5 00:00:09,120 --> 00:00:12,520 Welcome to County Connection, the official podcast of the Washington State 6 00:00:12,520 --> 00:00:15,840 Association of Counties, where we dive into the legislative issues 7 00:00:15,840 --> 00:00:19,280 shaping the future of our communities from budgets to public safety, 8 00:00:19,360 --> 00:00:23,480 infrastructure to elections will break down what's happening in Olympia 9 00:00:23,680 --> 00:00:26,480 and how it impacts counties from across the evergreen state. 10 00:00:26,480 --> 00:00:30,280 Stay informed, stay engaged and join us as we amplify the voice 11 00:00:30,280 --> 00:00:32,240 of Washington's 39 counties. 12 00:00:34,240 --> 00:00:37,520 Welcome back, everyone, to episode four of the County Connection. 13 00:00:37,760 --> 00:00:41,720 I'm Paul Jewell, government relations director for the Washington State 14 00:00:41,720 --> 00:00:45,200 Association of Counties and your host on the County Connection. 15 00:00:45,440 --> 00:00:49,960 And I'm here today with Axel Swanson, the managing director 16 00:00:49,960 --> 00:00:53,320 of the Washington State Association of County Engineers. 17 00:00:53,320 --> 00:00:56,280 Axel, we are right before cutoff. 18 00:00:56,280 --> 00:01:00,440 It's Wednesday of Cut-Off Week, week six here in the legislative session. 19 00:01:00,920 --> 00:01:02,440 How are things going for you so far? 20 00:01:02,480 --> 00:01:03,960 Well, thanks, Paul. Thanks for having me back. 21 00:01:03,960 --> 00:01:08,000 It is good to be here at the Wasack podcast again to talk about 22 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:10,160 transportation and transportation priorities. 23 00:01:10,640 --> 00:01:15,280 And I, you know, overall feel pretty good about session so far. 24 00:01:15,280 --> 00:01:16,640 It's it's very busy. 25 00:01:17,280 --> 00:01:19,920 There are ups and downs and that. 26 00:01:19,920 --> 00:01:24,360 But, you know, if you go into it understanding that and you have your 27 00:01:24,360 --> 00:01:27,800 expectations set and so, yeah, you're right. 28 00:01:27,840 --> 00:01:29,000 Friday's cutoff. 29 00:01:29,000 --> 00:01:32,480 Cut-off can be good and bad, as you know, as a veteran of session. 30 00:01:32,480 --> 00:01:34,120 So double edged sword, that's for sure. 31 00:01:34,120 --> 00:01:38,720 Sometimes things that you really care about and have been working on very hard 32 00:01:38,720 --> 00:01:43,120 don't make it out of committee and other things that you think still need to be 33 00:01:43,120 --> 00:01:44,680 worked on don't make it out of committee. 34 00:01:44,680 --> 00:01:45,960 Or they do make it out of committee. 35 00:01:45,960 --> 00:01:46,720 Yeah, or they do. 36 00:01:46,720 --> 00:01:51,400 But the good thing about cutoff is it's sort of level sets kind of where you're at. 37 00:01:51,400 --> 00:01:52,400 And so it does. 38 00:01:52,400 --> 00:01:58,600 It is to me a significant, I'll call it a downshift, you know, in terms of just 39 00:01:58,600 --> 00:02:04,320 the sheer number of issues that you are trying to educate yourself on and talk to 40 00:02:04,320 --> 00:02:08,520 the members about and just candidly not embarrass yourself about. 41 00:02:08,520 --> 00:02:12,000 I mean, we're getting you're just looking at all the bills that get filed and trying 42 00:02:12,000 --> 00:02:14,640 to do a good job reviewing those and understand the issues. 43 00:02:14,640 --> 00:02:19,520 And it's very easy in that early session environment to miss something or make a 44 00:02:19,520 --> 00:02:20,240 mistake. 45 00:02:20,240 --> 00:02:24,120 Yeah, I was just looking at the number of bills that have been introduced so far in 46 00:02:24,120 --> 00:02:27,160 just the first six weeks of session, including the pre filed bills. 47 00:02:27,480 --> 00:02:29,120 And we're almost at 2000. 48 00:02:29,760 --> 00:02:34,320 And that's just a huge number of bills to try to cover in a short period of time. 49 00:02:34,480 --> 00:02:35,280 Yep, it is. 50 00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:39,480 And you know, what I've noticed more this session than in my previous sessions 51 00:02:39,480 --> 00:02:42,760 doing this is there's a little bit of a rhythm to it. 52 00:02:42,760 --> 00:02:47,200 And those bills that are pre filed for me, at least this year, I tended to kind of 53 00:02:47,200 --> 00:02:49,040 know more about them and understand them. 54 00:02:49,240 --> 00:02:54,640 Or maybe they had a lot of support support or maybe they had opposition, but everybody 55 00:02:54,640 --> 00:02:56,080 kind of knew where they stood. 56 00:02:56,440 --> 00:02:59,840 It's these bills the last couple of weeks before cutoff where I really kind of 57 00:02:59,880 --> 00:03:04,800 noticed, you know, those are maybe newer ideas that a legislator or stakeholders 58 00:03:04,800 --> 00:03:07,160 are excited about, but they haven't been fully vetted. 59 00:03:07,160 --> 00:03:10,360 And so you're getting a fresh look at an idea and language that's going to 60 00:03:10,360 --> 00:03:11,720 potentially become law. 61 00:03:11,720 --> 00:03:13,080 And you're doing it on a quick turn. 62 00:03:13,080 --> 00:03:15,320 Sometimes they get dropped and the hearing is just a few days. 63 00:03:15,360 --> 00:03:18,840 Yeah, especially when you approach these cutoffs, sometimes you get really 64 00:03:18,840 --> 00:03:22,760 important bills kind of right before the end and you've and they can be long and 65 00:03:22,760 --> 00:03:23,800 they can be complicated. 66 00:03:24,240 --> 00:03:26,880 And suddenly you're faced with the proposition of having to make some 67 00:03:26,880 --> 00:03:29,240 decisions on how you're going to take a position on a bill. 68 00:03:29,240 --> 00:03:31,280 And it could be the chair's bill. 69 00:03:31,280 --> 00:03:35,000 It could be, you know, some of leadership or it could be something that's 70 00:03:35,080 --> 00:03:35,920 important to the budget. 71 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:37,400 We're going to talk about a few of those. 72 00:03:38,000 --> 00:03:40,520 But before we do that, I've got a couple other questions. 73 00:03:40,520 --> 00:03:44,120 If you don't mind, you know, the last couple of times you were here, we've 74 00:03:44,120 --> 00:03:48,040 talked about different transportation pieces and we've talked about some 75 00:03:48,040 --> 00:03:52,760 specific legislation, but we really never talked about kind of why 76 00:03:53,240 --> 00:03:55,480 transportation is so important to counties. 77 00:03:55,480 --> 00:03:58,960 You're the managing director of the Washington State Association of County 78 00:03:58,960 --> 00:03:59,720 Engineers. 79 00:04:00,200 --> 00:04:03,480 And for those who don't know, county engineers really work in our public 80 00:04:03,480 --> 00:04:06,520 works departments at counties and our public works departments are the 81 00:04:06,520 --> 00:04:08,680 departments that are in charge of road maintenance. 82 00:04:08,680 --> 00:04:10,600 Road construction, right? 83 00:04:10,640 --> 00:04:12,640 Bridge maintenance and construction. 84 00:04:13,360 --> 00:04:20,080 Why are counties so interested and why is transportation so important to us 85 00:04:20,080 --> 00:04:24,520 that we have a whole association separate, but affiliated with WSAC that 86 00:04:24,520 --> 00:04:26,720 you manage that oversees this issue? 87 00:04:26,840 --> 00:04:27,200 Yeah. 88 00:04:27,400 --> 00:04:32,200 Well, you know, if you look back or study history and sort of the 89 00:04:32,200 --> 00:04:36,600 development of certainly local governments, you see that transportation 90 00:04:36,600 --> 00:04:41,320 that is getting folks from point A to point B was one of the original just 91 00:04:41,520 --> 00:04:44,960 needs that everybody had an interest in and supported. 92 00:04:44,960 --> 00:04:47,480 And so we're talking like before the rain and roads, right? 93 00:04:47,480 --> 00:04:52,640 We have a little book that our association did around its hundred 94 00:04:52,640 --> 00:04:54,960 year anniversary and that was in 2006. 95 00:04:55,920 --> 00:04:59,520 So, you know, going back and then, as you know, we may need to do a 96 00:04:59,520 --> 00:05:04,160 podcast on this or have done, but, you know, there were counties here before 97 00:05:04,160 --> 00:05:06,680 the state became state 1889. 98 00:05:06,680 --> 00:05:07,880 Yeah, there were territorial counties. 99 00:05:07,920 --> 00:05:08,080 Yeah. 100 00:05:08,080 --> 00:05:12,800 So we, you know, we had very early counties, early county government. 101 00:05:12,800 --> 00:05:17,640 And again, one of those primary early functions was establishing roadways and 102 00:05:17,640 --> 00:05:21,440 being able to get, you know, people around commerce and everything else. 103 00:05:21,840 --> 00:05:24,520 So, so there's a long history there. 104 00:05:24,560 --> 00:05:28,200 The county engineer position, as you mentioned, is part of that. 105 00:05:28,200 --> 00:05:32,280 And it's kind of a very unique position for counties, but also 106 00:05:32,280 --> 00:05:36,720 in statute counties are required by statute to have a county engineer. 107 00:05:37,560 --> 00:05:43,800 And the county engineer has a host of duties and responsibilities that, you 108 00:05:43,800 --> 00:05:47,960 know, are within their purview, not just at the local kind of county 109 00:05:47,960 --> 00:05:49,240 ordinance level, but in statute. 110 00:05:49,240 --> 00:05:52,920 So, so when you say counties are required by statute, that's a legal 111 00:05:52,920 --> 00:05:57,080 requirement that the county has to employ an engineer on staff. 112 00:05:57,080 --> 00:05:59,240 How long has that been the case in Washington? 113 00:05:59,280 --> 00:06:00,080 I should know that. 114 00:06:00,080 --> 00:06:04,040 Off the top of my head, but I don't, but I know that you have previously 115 00:06:04,040 --> 00:06:07,560 interviewed Jane Wall, executive director of the county road administration board. 116 00:06:07,560 --> 00:06:12,840 And so they're largely engaged now with this as they became an agency. 117 00:06:12,840 --> 00:06:17,680 And so the county road administration board is, you know, kind of woven into 118 00:06:17,720 --> 00:06:21,200 the fabric of not only county public works, but the county engineer position. 119 00:06:21,200 --> 00:06:23,800 And they track that and they're part of their role is to make sure that each 120 00:06:23,800 --> 00:06:30,480 county has a county engineer and, or, you know, has someone designated if 121 00:06:30,520 --> 00:06:34,280 should there be a vacancy because of the, you know, the key responsibilities that they have. 122 00:06:34,320 --> 00:06:38,400 You know, I gave a presentation, geez, a couple of months ago at a forestry 123 00:06:38,400 --> 00:06:41,400 conference and one of the, one of the questions that I asked, because people 124 00:06:41,400 --> 00:06:46,360 always ask me what counties do for, you know, what, what, what counties do for 125 00:06:46,360 --> 00:06:49,320 the public and one of my opening questions was I said, who here can tell 126 00:06:49,320 --> 00:06:51,360 me the eight things that counties do for you? 127 00:06:51,360 --> 00:06:54,120 And a bunch of people raised their hand and I said, you're all wrong because 128 00:06:54,120 --> 00:06:55,000 it's a trick question. 129 00:06:55,000 --> 00:06:57,400 There are about 83 things that counties do for you. 130 00:06:57,400 --> 00:07:02,280 But back when I was a county commissioner and you and I served about the same time, 131 00:07:02,280 --> 00:07:10,480 I got elected in 2008 and within the first year or so, an older elderly 132 00:07:10,480 --> 00:07:14,760 gentleman came to see me who was a resident of the county and he told, he 133 00:07:14,760 --> 00:07:18,240 wanted to talk to me about an issue with his farm, but he started out by saying 134 00:07:18,240 --> 00:07:22,520 that he used to be a county commissioner and, and I got to talk into him a little 135 00:07:22,520 --> 00:07:26,480 bit about it and it had been probably 40 or 50 years since he'd been a commissioner. 136 00:07:26,480 --> 00:07:30,960 And one of the things that he told me was back in those days, they called us 137 00:07:30,960 --> 00:07:32,040 road commissioners. 138 00:07:32,040 --> 00:07:34,760 We didn't do all the things that you guys do today. 139 00:07:34,760 --> 00:07:37,600 It really was mostly about roads. 140 00:07:37,600 --> 00:07:40,840 And if you look at a lot of the historical photos that we have around the office, 141 00:07:40,840 --> 00:07:45,800 you know, the old black and whites, it's always the, the county commissioners 142 00:07:45,800 --> 00:07:50,640 together kind of, you know, at the same types of meetings and the same types of 143 00:07:50,640 --> 00:07:51,640 conventions. 144 00:07:51,640 --> 00:07:55,960 So things have really changed over time, but there's a long, long history here 145 00:07:55,960 --> 00:08:02,520 associated with how counties are responsible for and why transportation is 146 00:08:02,520 --> 00:08:08,240 such a big deal to county government and both the members that you represent and 147 00:08:08,240 --> 00:08:11,640 the members that our association wide represents. 148 00:08:11,640 --> 00:08:15,840 Yeah. I think he, I think he said that well, and certainly many of the stories in 149 00:08:15,840 --> 00:08:19,240 the book I mentioned capture that and they're, they're really fun to read. 150 00:08:19,240 --> 00:08:23,880 And, and I should say one thing that we are looking at from an association 151 00:08:23,880 --> 00:08:28,840 standpoint, the Washington state association of county engineers, as much 152 00:08:28,840 --> 00:08:33,880 as we just discussed that county engineer position, our association is 153 00:08:33,880 --> 00:08:37,880 working towards, you know, making sure we're representing the county 154 00:08:37,880 --> 00:08:41,880 public works departments. There are many public works directors that are not 155 00:08:41,880 --> 00:08:47,680 engineers. We care very deeply about, you know, all the other aspects of public 156 00:08:47,680 --> 00:08:51,680 work. We do road supervisors. And you think about like that, you know, just 157 00:08:51,680 --> 00:08:56,280 conversation that you were having with the constituent there, but you know, so 158 00:08:56,280 --> 00:09:00,880 often that's the primary interface people are having is, you know, you come 159 00:09:00,880 --> 00:09:04,800 out one morning and there's four inches of snow and you hear the sound of a 160 00:09:04,800 --> 00:09:09,480 truck or a truck or a truck or a truck or a truck. And then you know, you 161 00:09:09,480 --> 00:09:12,880 come out one morning and there's four inches of snow and you hear, you know, 162 00:09:12,880 --> 00:09:16,880 down the driveway, there's someone's out there plowing or a tree or a branch 163 00:09:16,880 --> 00:09:21,480 had fallen or something like that. I mean, that's a lot of, you know, I think 164 00:09:21,480 --> 00:09:25,880 fortunately the public's interaction with counties is the good work we do 165 00:09:25,880 --> 00:09:29,880 hopefully in the, in the roadway to keep them able to go where they need to go. 166 00:09:29,880 --> 00:09:37,880 You know, counties have a big interest in transportation. How much of the roads, 167 00:09:37,880 --> 00:09:41,680 I think you've mentioned this before, Axel, but for the listener, as we're kind 168 00:09:41,680 --> 00:09:45,800 of talking about, we're going to go into some some legislation here in a 169 00:09:45,800 --> 00:09:50,440 minute, but you know, how much of the roads do counties manage compared to say 170 00:09:50,440 --> 00:09:55,440 cities or the state in Washington? A great deal. And so for a lot of the 171 00:09:55,440 --> 00:10:00,240 history we just got into there, you know, counties have been responsible and in 172 00:10:00,240 --> 00:10:05,120 charge of roads for a long time in the state, even before stated. So we, we own 173 00:10:05,120 --> 00:10:11,560 the majority of, you know, road miles, whether you want to say we have 39,000 174 00:10:11,560 --> 00:10:16,160 centerline miles, which would be one way and then the other way, or 78,000 total 175 00:10:16,160 --> 00:10:19,760 lane miles, which would just be, you know, the amount of road we own one 176 00:10:19,760 --> 00:10:26,520 direction. But just to put that in perspective, that is, you know, more than 177 00:10:26,520 --> 00:10:32,120 half of all of the lane miles that are owned by the state, the cities, and the 178 00:10:32,120 --> 00:10:37,160 county. So think of those three jurisdictions put together. We own, you 179 00:10:37,160 --> 00:10:40,720 know, well over half of those. So the counties own more than the cities and 180 00:10:40,720 --> 00:10:44,880 the state combined? Correct, yep. Okay. Now what folks need to understand, and 181 00:10:44,880 --> 00:10:49,740 I've said this before, is cities are all obviously incorporated in urban and then 182 00:10:49,740 --> 00:10:53,520 the state owns, you know, our large infrastructure, the highways in the 183 00:10:53,520 --> 00:10:58,040 state highways. So we do not have the average daily traffic, the number of 184 00:10:58,040 --> 00:11:02,640 vehicles or people going from point A to point B, that oftentimes certainly a 185 00:11:02,640 --> 00:11:07,840 state route would have or a city street, but we just own a lot of infrastructure. 186 00:11:07,840 --> 00:11:14,680 Okay. Now you got a recent study too, that talked about, you know, some of our 187 00:11:14,680 --> 00:11:19,600 needs for the transportation system, some of, and I know it helps to 188 00:11:19,600 --> 00:11:23,400 define some of our priorities, and this year, as you know, revenue for 189 00:11:23,400 --> 00:11:30,400 transportation is a priority for WSAC. What did the recent study say that could 190 00:11:30,400 --> 00:11:34,480 be relevant to our conversation today? Yeah, it doesn't paint a good picture of 191 00:11:34,480 --> 00:11:39,040 our local county revenues being able to keep up with our needed 192 00:11:39,040 --> 00:11:43,580 expenditures. And just before we leave the infrastructure piece and move on to 193 00:11:43,580 --> 00:11:49,360 the road usage charge bill and or our revenue situation, the other thing about 194 00:11:49,360 --> 00:11:52,960 all those lane miles, and I've mentioned this too, but when you have that many 195 00:11:52,960 --> 00:11:56,520 lane miles of road, you got that many water crossings and bridges. And so 196 00:11:56,520 --> 00:12:02,440 counties own 45% of all the bridges in Washington, so almost half, not quite half, 197 00:12:02,440 --> 00:12:08,440 of all the bridges in the state are the responsibility of counties. And we must 198 00:12:08,440 --> 00:12:13,760 be the envy of everyone. Those bridges are really expensive. That makes us 199 00:12:13,760 --> 00:12:17,320 really valuable, doesn't it? No, it doesn't. And you know, and if you think 200 00:12:17,320 --> 00:12:22,480 about when infrastructure was built and sort of things like that, we have a lot 201 00:12:22,480 --> 00:12:28,360 of them that are of a similar age and starting to deteriorate. And we do a 202 00:12:28,360 --> 00:12:32,240 great job of inventorying them and checking their condition, but you know, 203 00:12:32,240 --> 00:12:36,640 they're just getting older and they're expensive to fix. We have roughly 4% of 204 00:12:36,640 --> 00:12:39,960 the county bridges are what's considered in poor condition. And when you use 205 00:12:39,960 --> 00:12:42,760 percentages, sometimes it's hard to tell, well, you're doing pretty good, but 206 00:12:42,760 --> 00:12:46,280 that's 150 bridges around the state that are in poor condition. What do you do 207 00:12:46,280 --> 00:12:50,120 when you have a bridge that's in poor condition and you don't have the money 208 00:12:50,120 --> 00:12:54,320 to replace it? Because that's why I assume, I assume it's rated in poor 209 00:12:54,320 --> 00:12:57,080 condition because if they had the money to fix it or replace it, they would have 210 00:12:57,080 --> 00:13:00,360 done so already. So what do you do in that instance? Yeah, certainly we would 211 00:13:00,360 --> 00:13:03,760 always hope those bridges, you know, and again, it's one of the reasons we keep 212 00:13:03,760 --> 00:13:09,400 close track of this and categorize things, but it could mean a number of 213 00:13:09,400 --> 00:13:12,740 things. So it always kind of depends on, you know, where the bridge is, what the 214 00:13:12,740 --> 00:13:17,320 situation is, but certainly it could mean it's load rated. So it's, there's 215 00:13:17,320 --> 00:13:21,840 signage saying, you know, that the bridge cannot take, you know, a load over this 216 00:13:21,840 --> 00:13:27,760 number of pounds. So I've seen those signs. So that's that sign that'll, it 217 00:13:27,760 --> 00:13:33,220 basically says, you know, like a gross volume weight limit and it'll say bridge 218 00:13:33,220 --> 00:13:37,760 ahead is limited to, you know, 10,000 pounds or 2,000 pounds or whatever it 219 00:13:37,760 --> 00:13:42,520 might be. And so what does that mean? Does that mean as I'm approaching the 220 00:13:42,520 --> 00:13:48,080 bridge and I should know the weight of my vehicle and decide whether I'm going to 221 00:13:48,080 --> 00:13:51,320 cross that bridge or not? Well, certainly that's, yeah, I think that's the idea. And 222 00:13:51,320 --> 00:13:56,000 I'm not a complete expert on, you know, load weights and trucking routes and 223 00:13:56,000 --> 00:13:59,560 things like that, but certainly the hope is that if you're carrying a load 224 00:13:59,560 --> 00:14:04,080 that's a significant amount of weight, you are responsible for paying attention 225 00:14:04,080 --> 00:14:07,600 to those things. And in many cases, I would think even planning your route or 226 00:14:07,600 --> 00:14:11,560 knowing what route is available to take. So that really applies to people that 227 00:14:11,560 --> 00:14:15,840 are hauling things. Yeah, I think in most cases, but again, going back to like if 228 00:14:15,840 --> 00:14:19,120 the bridge is in poor condition, it could be any, it could be, I mean, you 229 00:14:19,120 --> 00:14:23,240 might have something occur that creates a problem or it's happened over time. But 230 00:14:23,240 --> 00:14:26,560 again, going back to the county engineer and other staff, part of that job was it 231 00:14:26,560 --> 00:14:30,600 to make a decision and, you know, that could be closure and a detoured route, or 232 00:14:30,600 --> 00:14:34,760 it could just be it's in poor condition and it's on, you know, a priority list 233 00:14:35,120 --> 00:14:39,480 for repairs. So there's obviously a scale like with anything else there. So how 234 00:14:39,480 --> 00:14:43,920 many did you say, well, we had that we're that rating? I'm just looking at the list 235 00:14:43,920 --> 00:14:49,280 here and it just looked like of all of them, roughly 4% currently for counties 236 00:14:49,720 --> 00:14:54,360 are on a, and that's 150 are on a poor condition list, you know, so we going 237 00:14:54,360 --> 00:14:56,720 back, you know, we've got a lot of priorities, we have a lot of 238 00:14:56,720 --> 00:14:59,280 infrastructure, which means we have a lot of priorities. The study we just 239 00:14:59,280 --> 00:15:03,120 received, which you mentioned shows that. And unfortunately, what it shows is that 240 00:15:03,120 --> 00:15:07,160 we're going in the wrong direction with the revenue that we have available, 241 00:15:07,160 --> 00:15:10,560 especially the two primary revenue sources, which I think is what we should 242 00:15:10,560 --> 00:15:14,600 talk about, maybe focus on today. The two primary revenue sources that counties 243 00:15:14,600 --> 00:15:19,760 depend on for the road fund are first property tax, which probably a time for 244 00:15:19,760 --> 00:15:23,720 another podcast, but also relevant to our legislative session. You know, 245 00:15:23,720 --> 00:15:29,520 property tax for counties is not only complicated and controversial, but it's 246 00:15:29,520 --> 00:15:33,640 been capped at 1% plus new construction since I think 2001 or so. 247 00:15:33,640 --> 00:15:37,160 Well, and it's not just transportation that relies on property tax. The counties 248 00:15:37,160 --> 00:15:41,200 rely on property tax for most of the general functions of the county 249 00:15:41,200 --> 00:15:45,880 government. Correct. And so that puts added stress on general fund mandates 250 00:15:45,880 --> 00:15:50,520 and requirements, which in some unfortunate situations can also lead to 251 00:15:50,520 --> 00:15:56,120 more stress on the road fund itself. But that being said, the road fund in one 252 00:15:56,120 --> 00:16:00,680 nuance here that this study does that the previous study we did didn't do the 253 00:16:00,680 --> 00:16:04,240 previous study kind of looked at all counties and it did. It did break them 254 00:16:04,240 --> 00:16:07,920 down urban versus rural. This one breaks them down into smaller categories. The 255 00:16:07,920 --> 00:16:12,720 reason that's important is you can really see which counties kind of by 256 00:16:12,720 --> 00:16:16,920 rural or size population base, those kinds of things rely on which revenue 257 00:16:16,920 --> 00:16:22,240 sources more. The reason I bring that up is I kind of always assumed for a long 258 00:16:22,240 --> 00:16:27,360 time that property tax was the primary revenue source for county road funds. I 259 00:16:27,360 --> 00:16:32,160 knew that fluctuated dependent on kind of the county and the size of the county 260 00:16:32,160 --> 00:16:39,120 character of the county, but I was wrong. And what the study shows is that the 261 00:16:39,120 --> 00:16:44,920 more urban a county is. So overall, if you roll up all counties statewide, the road 262 00:16:44,920 --> 00:16:50,000 fund is about 50% dependent on property tax and about 20% dependent on motor 263 00:16:50,000 --> 00:16:57,240 vehicle tax. I'm sorry, gas tax, just say gas tax. If you look at what we would 264 00:16:57,240 --> 00:17:03,240 label rural frontier one counties, so the kind of think the most rural counties 265 00:17:03,240 --> 00:17:10,600 we have, they depend on gas tax not for 20% of revenue, but for 40% twice as 266 00:17:10,600 --> 00:17:15,160 much. That's the rural counties? Rural counties. Wow. And then if you jump over 267 00:17:15,160 --> 00:17:20,800 to urban counties, be our larger urban counties, they're 15%, but their property 268 00:17:20,800 --> 00:17:27,600 tax is at 62%. Whereas for those rural frontier one counties, it's at 33%. So 269 00:17:27,600 --> 00:17:30,480 about half as much. There's a big difference. Well, that's interesting. I 270 00:17:30,480 --> 00:17:34,080 would not have intuitively thought that that was the case. I would have actually 271 00:17:34,080 --> 00:17:38,520 thought exactly the opposite. Yeah, and it kind of caught me as well. And it's 272 00:17:38,520 --> 00:17:42,320 one reason I like the different way that the study was done this time. And I think 273 00:17:42,320 --> 00:17:45,480 some reasoning around that's got me thinking about property tax a little, and 274 00:17:45,480 --> 00:17:49,400 maybe you, looking forward. But there's just, there's in our rural counties, 275 00:17:49,400 --> 00:17:54,360 there's not much of a tax base, right? Also, and now we're just you and I talking 276 00:17:54,360 --> 00:17:57,960 here without thinking it through, some of those rural frontier one counties, 277 00:17:57,960 --> 00:18:01,040 I'm thinking to have a lot of timberlands, which I know you're a subject 278 00:18:01,040 --> 00:18:04,480 matter expert in, but a lot of public timberlands potentially, which also would 279 00:18:04,480 --> 00:18:07,680 limit, I think, your property tax base. So I don't know, some things to think about. 280 00:18:07,680 --> 00:18:11,920 Those things definitely would. And I have to tell you, talking about things on the 281 00:18:11,920 --> 00:18:16,220 podcast without fully thinking them through is my specialty. So we 282 00:18:16,220 --> 00:18:19,800 should not hesitate to do that. In fact, I think our listeners expect us to do 283 00:18:19,800 --> 00:18:23,880 that. But no, I think you make some really interesting points there. You're 284 00:18:23,880 --> 00:18:29,360 right, in general rural counties will have a lower property tax 285 00:18:29,360 --> 00:18:33,400 base. It's because their property values are lower. That's one case, because they 286 00:18:33,400 --> 00:18:37,560 have less urban areas, right? Less commercial and industrial property, etc. 287 00:18:37,560 --> 00:18:42,120 Generally more agricultural land. Or it could be other types of resource lands 288 00:18:42,120 --> 00:18:45,560 that you mentioned, like timberland, which are taxed at much lower rates, both 289 00:18:45,560 --> 00:18:50,960 agriculture and timber. And then if you throw in a fairly good 290 00:18:50,960 --> 00:18:55,040 percentage of public lands that don't pay any taxes at all, I guess it kind of 291 00:18:55,040 --> 00:19:00,200 makes sense. But I thought at the same time, because they're smaller, more rural 292 00:19:00,200 --> 00:19:03,520 in nature, and don't have as many residents, they also wouldn't have as 293 00:19:03,520 --> 00:19:08,700 many fuel sales, you know, sales of motor vehicle fuel that they would also be 294 00:19:08,700 --> 00:19:12,960 getting taxes from. And so I thought that might even it out a little bit, but it 295 00:19:12,960 --> 00:19:16,400 doesn't seem to be the case. They're actually more reliant on the fuel 296 00:19:16,400 --> 00:19:21,080 sales than they are on the property tax as a revenue source. Correct, that's what 297 00:19:21,080 --> 00:19:25,200 the study is showing. I think that goes to the model for how we distribute motor 298 00:19:25,200 --> 00:19:30,680 vehicle, just let's just say gas tax, for how we distribute fuel tax or gas tax 299 00:19:30,680 --> 00:19:36,480 around the state. And it's a combination of factors. And the first factor is 10% 300 00:19:36,480 --> 00:19:41,920 of fuel tax in Washington State is distributed kind of on just a even or 301 00:19:41,920 --> 00:19:46,480 equal share basis, which, you know, again, depends on where you're coming from. But 302 00:19:46,480 --> 00:19:51,920 that is helpful to a, I don't know, maybe a Wacayacum County or a, you know, a very 303 00:19:51,920 --> 00:19:57,800 tiny county in terms of population, you know, and even size that... So 304 00:19:57,800 --> 00:20:01,760 they're getting an inordinate share in that particular case. Yeah, I can't 305 00:20:01,760 --> 00:20:05,040 remember what year, but a while back there was, you know, that this was studied 306 00:20:05,040 --> 00:20:09,040 and it was kind of looked at for gas tax distributions and kind of, you know, how 307 00:20:09,040 --> 00:20:12,240 that works. And I think we touched on that previously in one of the other podcasts. 308 00:20:12,240 --> 00:20:16,440 We may have, yeah. So the other things, gas tax distribution looks at, there is 309 00:20:16,440 --> 00:20:21,920 population and that's important, obviously, for our urban counties. So it 310 00:20:21,920 --> 00:20:27,840 takes into account like equal share and then there's a population percentage, I 311 00:20:27,840 --> 00:20:33,320 think it's 30% based on sort of population. And then it also takes into 312 00:20:33,320 --> 00:20:37,480 account sort of the number of roads, that infrastructure component, because you, 313 00:20:37,480 --> 00:20:43,600 you could have a very low population county, but a lot of roadways or road 314 00:20:43,600 --> 00:20:47,520 miles, not the best example, but like Spokane County, I just know off the top of my head, 315 00:20:47,520 --> 00:20:52,640 they have a lot of infrastructure and road miles. So they would do better in 316 00:20:52,640 --> 00:20:55,400 that category because of the amount of infrastructure they have. And then there's 317 00:20:55,400 --> 00:21:00,040 another one that actually associates costs. I don't know if it's cost of 318 00:21:00,040 --> 00:21:04,840 replacement or cost to maintain that system, because you could have, you could 319 00:21:04,840 --> 00:21:08,600 have a different infrastructure that costs different amounts. Sure. I mean, 320 00:21:08,600 --> 00:21:13,800 the narrower roads aren't going to cost as much as say wider roads with paved 321 00:21:13,800 --> 00:21:18,640 shoulders or sidewalks in some cases, more some of them were urban counties. So 322 00:21:18,640 --> 00:21:22,240 you're saying the money gets split up all those ways it considers, you know, 323 00:21:22,240 --> 00:21:26,000 some of it gets just evenly split between all 39 counties. Then there's a 324 00:21:26,000 --> 00:21:30,920 population percentage, then there's a road miles or road mileage percentage, 325 00:21:30,920 --> 00:21:35,200 and then there's a cost of maintenance percentage. Yeah, I think that's close 326 00:21:35,200 --> 00:21:39,740 enough. Yeah, interesting. And again, you know, these things are out there and so 327 00:21:39,740 --> 00:21:43,240 we could touch on that in the future. But yeah, I think that the takeaway for gas 328 00:21:43,240 --> 00:21:46,120 tax, which is kind of primarily a good segue to what we're going to be talking 329 00:21:46,120 --> 00:21:49,360 about with the road usage charge, it does have a distribution model. And actually 330 00:21:49,360 --> 00:21:53,240 the current proposal that we'll get into, one of the things we like about it is it 331 00:21:53,240 --> 00:21:56,320 maintains that distribution model. Okay, so this is the second time you've 332 00:21:56,320 --> 00:22:00,160 mentioned the road usage charge, which is a little bit of a spoiler alert because 333 00:22:00,160 --> 00:22:03,840 I know we didn't really start the podcast saying that that's what we're 334 00:22:03,840 --> 00:22:08,600 going to talk about today. But I know that is the legislative proposal that you 335 00:22:08,600 --> 00:22:12,040 wanted to get a little bit into. And but you wanted to give some of this, you 336 00:22:12,040 --> 00:22:16,840 know, foundational or pre information first. Yep. Why don't we start? Why don't 337 00:22:16,840 --> 00:22:21,160 we get into the road usage charge? Let me argue with you on that a little bit. 338 00:22:21,160 --> 00:22:27,000 Okay, do I love a good argument? No, here we go. No, I am I am messing with 339 00:22:27,000 --> 00:22:30,720 duck or razor clam. That's all I need to know. Yeah, I am messing up the segue a 340 00:22:30,720 --> 00:22:35,000 little bit because I didn't get into some of the so just to close the loop 341 00:22:35,000 --> 00:22:39,480 on the study. So we talked a little bit about we jumped right into the which 342 00:22:39,480 --> 00:22:44,400 revenues are most important to county road funds, property tax, gas tax. We 343 00:22:44,400 --> 00:22:47,360 didn't talk about sort of some of the other conclusions in the study that I 344 00:22:47,360 --> 00:22:52,080 think are important. Those being and I'll just I'll keep it brief. But when 345 00:22:52,080 --> 00:22:56,120 you look at the revenues that we can generate statewide versus what we're 346 00:22:56,120 --> 00:23:01,560 what we need, we are going behind. And so what the what the group found that put 347 00:23:01,560 --> 00:23:05,640 the study out was that we're falling behind now somewhere between 800 million 348 00:23:05,640 --> 00:23:10,920 and 1.5 billion dollars a year, 1.5 billion with a B. Yeah, and that's up. So 349 00:23:10,920 --> 00:23:16,960 we did the original study in 2020. And that number was about 720 million to 1.2 350 00:23:16,960 --> 00:23:20,920 billion. So you can you know, that's been adjusted now. And you can see it's not 351 00:23:20,920 --> 00:23:25,480 going in a better direction. A lot of the reason that's increased too is with this 352 00:23:25,480 --> 00:23:29,440 study, we were able to do a better job of accounting for some things that we 353 00:23:29,440 --> 00:23:33,520 weren't able to do in the 2020 study. Those would include costs associated 354 00:23:33,520 --> 00:23:37,320 with fish passage barriers, which we have a lot for that reason. I said we own all 355 00:23:37,320 --> 00:23:41,200 those lane miles. We have a lot of water crossings. Unfortunately, we have a lot 356 00:23:41,200 --> 00:23:46,280 of fish passage barriers that we need to replace. Right. There's a lot of safety 357 00:23:46,280 --> 00:23:51,600 projects we were able to kind of look at for this. ADA compliance, planning and 358 00:23:51,600 --> 00:23:55,280 transitioning. I feel like we could do a whole podcast just on fish passage 359 00:23:55,280 --> 00:23:59,560 barrier. We could and we probably should. There's a lot going on with that. And so 360 00:23:59,560 --> 00:24:03,480 anyway, the good the good news, I guess about the bad news is we were able to 361 00:24:03,480 --> 00:24:08,200 pull in some costs that we have a better handle on now than we did in 2020. And so 362 00:24:08,200 --> 00:24:12,200 you see that number go up. And we also estimate that we're somewhere between 363 00:24:12,200 --> 00:24:17,480 3.4 and 4.3 billion dollars kind of total in total behind on deferred 364 00:24:17,480 --> 00:24:22,360 maintenance. So it's a it's a growing problem. The gas tax and its structural 365 00:24:22,360 --> 00:24:26,440 decline and we'll get into that with the road usage charge talk is a is a part of 366 00:24:26,440 --> 00:24:31,120 that as well as the sort of the flat revenue growth. I guess you can't call it 367 00:24:31,120 --> 00:24:34,760 revenue growth. It's flat, but the property tax not growing as fast as 368 00:24:34,760 --> 00:24:40,160 inflation is creating that issue too. And so the the the study had a number 369 00:24:40,160 --> 00:24:44,320 of recommendations and I'll I'll save those for another another show. But but 370 00:24:44,320 --> 00:24:48,240 yeah, we are definitely going the wrong direction and the road usage charge has 371 00:24:48,240 --> 00:24:53,080 been an idea around for a long time and it's been a bill before and it's come 372 00:24:53,080 --> 00:24:57,280 back this session and I will I'll leave it to you to ask me some questions about 373 00:24:57,280 --> 00:25:01,520 it. But I will say it's one component I think of a transportation revenue 374 00:25:01,520 --> 00:25:05,160 solution. Well, you know, most people just let me have a conversation but you're 375 00:25:05,160 --> 00:25:09,000 like cracking the whip over there and saying, hey interviewer, do your job. Okay 376 00:25:09,000 --> 00:25:13,540 let's let's let's get into it then. So the road usage charge so we've 377 00:25:13,540 --> 00:25:16,720 established let's go back a little bit. So we've established why transportation 378 00:25:16,720 --> 00:25:19,080 is important to counties. We kind of talked about some of the recent 379 00:25:19,080 --> 00:25:24,400 information that you got on the updated study around you know the costs for 380 00:25:24,400 --> 00:25:28,800 maintenance and how our revenues are keeping up or in most cases not keeping 381 00:25:28,800 --> 00:25:34,320 up with that preservation and preservation. Wow I'm having a hard time 382 00:25:34,320 --> 00:25:39,280 with that word today. Preservation and maintenance kind of agenda. But here we 383 00:25:39,280 --> 00:25:44,860 are now and the legislature is looking at it a whole other way potentially to 384 00:25:44,860 --> 00:25:48,400 fund the transportation system and that's what's called that's what you've 385 00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:54,160 referred to a couple of times as the Ruck or the road usage charge. In like 10 386 00:25:54,160 --> 00:26:00,240 seconds or less why is this new proposal where did it come from and why is it 387 00:26:00,240 --> 00:26:04,800 even necessary to think about? It's necessary to think about because we've 388 00:26:04,800 --> 00:26:10,920 known for a long time I won't say decades but probably decades that the 389 00:26:10,920 --> 00:26:17,480 gas tax as our primary funding source is going to decline and not keep up with 390 00:26:17,480 --> 00:26:23,440 the need to maintain our transportation system. So we've been looking at this 391 00:26:23,440 --> 00:26:27,640 understanding the problem is coming and trying to come up with a solution and 392 00:26:27,640 --> 00:26:34,720 studying solutions for quite a while because we are also working 393 00:26:34,720 --> 00:26:39,680 towards environmental goals and those are important policy initiatives and 394 00:26:39,680 --> 00:26:44,400 when you do that we're looking at trying to get away from gas-powered vehicles so 395 00:26:44,400 --> 00:26:49,360 we are there we're seeing many many more hybrid and electric vehicles on 396 00:26:49,360 --> 00:26:53,920 the road being purchased and driving and so those vehicles are not paying 397 00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:58,480 gas tax. So that's a you asked for a short version that was a long version 398 00:26:58,480 --> 00:27:05,680 but yeah the short version is fuel economy is unfortunately leading us to 399 00:27:05,680 --> 00:27:09,240 a situation where we can't pay for our transportation system. So we established 400 00:27:09,240 --> 00:27:12,320 just a few minutes ago when we were talking about how counties pay for 401 00:27:12,320 --> 00:27:17,040 transportation that property tax is a big piece and that fuel that gas tax is 402 00:27:17,040 --> 00:27:20,540 another another big piece and what you're saying is we've known for a while 403 00:27:20,540 --> 00:27:23,920 that gas tax revenues are actually going to decline if they're not already 404 00:27:23,920 --> 00:27:27,800 declining and it's a function of fuel efficiency in vehicles and you also 405 00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:30,720 mentioned some of our broader environmental goals around greenhouse 406 00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:34,920 gas emissions and reductions and less reliance on fossil fuels which is 407 00:27:34,920 --> 00:27:39,640 fueling the, for lack of a better word, the transition to more electrical 408 00:27:39,640 --> 00:27:44,920 vehicles. So is this new road usage charge first of all is it what it sounds 409 00:27:44,920 --> 00:27:50,240 like and secondly is it meant to provide new revenue or is it meant to replace 410 00:27:50,240 --> 00:27:55,600 the revenue that we currently get from gas tax? Yeah so great question and 411 00:27:55,600 --> 00:28:00,160 that's why I kind of let in with saying we feel that a road usage charge is a 412 00:28:00,160 --> 00:28:06,200 component of a solution because the way that this has been studied and again 413 00:28:06,200 --> 00:28:09,920 this has been studied by our Washington State Transportation Commission for well 414 00:28:09,920 --> 00:28:14,200 over a decade. I think they've been working on this since 2012 and so for 415 00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:18,840 any listener who wants to look into this I highly recommend going to the 416 00:28:18,840 --> 00:28:21,640 Washington State Transportation Commission website. They have an entire 417 00:28:21,640 --> 00:28:27,000 page and volumes of information that they have made available there and it's 418 00:28:27,000 --> 00:28:32,160 really interesting. Sounds like exciting stuff. Well it is and I think but 419 00:28:32,160 --> 00:28:35,920 you know I am engaged in this and there's been two hearings about this and 420 00:28:35,920 --> 00:28:39,960 I want to acknowledge and respect the fact that I'm hearing a lot of questions 421 00:28:39,960 --> 00:28:44,360 about it and concerns and we've worked through those you know not all of them 422 00:28:44,360 --> 00:28:48,520 in fact we're still kind of thinking through some of these but I think it's 423 00:28:48,520 --> 00:28:52,320 important to point people in the direction of the Transportation 424 00:28:52,320 --> 00:28:54,680 Commission because they've done a lot of this work and they're really good at 425 00:28:54,680 --> 00:28:59,520 answering some of these questions. So the road usage charge or a per mile charge 426 00:28:59,520 --> 00:29:04,240 it's not a new concept. I think I'm looking at some information the 427 00:29:04,240 --> 00:29:07,640 Commission's provided. There's four states that have adopted some version 428 00:29:07,640 --> 00:29:12,760 of a program and then there's another 40 states that are researching it and we 429 00:29:12,760 --> 00:29:17,160 you know we're included in that. Okay but you said so this says this is called a 430 00:29:17,160 --> 00:29:22,080 road usage charge but you just call it a per mile charge. What's the 431 00:29:22,080 --> 00:29:27,000 difference and what do you mean by a per mile charge? Am I gonna pay for every 432 00:29:27,000 --> 00:29:32,360 mile of road that I use? Do I pay for all the you know miles of roads that exist 433 00:29:32,360 --> 00:29:37,240 in some sort of new program? How does it actually work? Yeah so at the most 434 00:29:37,240 --> 00:29:40,400 fundamental level I think it's important for folks here too that I think one of 435 00:29:40,400 --> 00:29:44,280 the biggest questions we get as well you know so am I gonna continue to pay gas 436 00:29:44,280 --> 00:29:49,400 tax and then have a road usage charge and we'll get into that. When I say 437 00:29:49,400 --> 00:29:55,160 per mile charge it is in the road usage charge is intended to kind of replicate 438 00:29:55,160 --> 00:29:59,680 or look a lot and feel like a gas tax. Right now you know depending on your 439 00:29:59,680 --> 00:30:05,000 car's fuel efficiency you go and you fill up your tank and as part of 440 00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:09,380 that charge for the gas you're paying tax that comes and pays for the road 441 00:30:09,380 --> 00:30:14,520 that you're gonna drive on. So depending on your vehicle's fuel economy you're 442 00:30:14,520 --> 00:30:20,520 paying some amount per mile right? Per mile to get there already. Yeah if I've got a 443 00:30:20,520 --> 00:30:27,360 more fuel efficient car I'm probably paying less if I'm driving a 1975 GMC 444 00:30:27,360 --> 00:30:32,800 you know power wagon or was it Dodge that met I think it was Dodge that made 445 00:30:32,800 --> 00:30:37,840 the power wagon excuse me Dodge I'm probably paying a lot more per mile. You 446 00:30:37,840 --> 00:30:43,800 are under the current gas tax system correct so the road usage charge would 447 00:30:43,800 --> 00:30:50,200 have an impact on that but you this what this tries to do is tie your amount 448 00:30:50,200 --> 00:30:56,280 owed directly to how many miles you're driving. Now I want to slow down on this 449 00:30:56,280 --> 00:30:59,600 a little bit the bit because we're talking about a specific bill we're kind 450 00:30:59,600 --> 00:31:03,320 of talking about a concept but then we can't go too slow we'll be here all day. Yeah we 451 00:31:03,320 --> 00:31:07,920 will but well I just want to pause here to say the bill that's being considered 452 00:31:07,920 --> 00:31:14,720 House Bill 1921 and there's a Senate version it starts off in phases and and 453 00:31:14,720 --> 00:31:19,360 it starts off voluntary so that's that's an important thing because I think the 454 00:31:19,360 --> 00:31:23,280 sponsors would kind of be the first to admit we don't have every question 455 00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:28,520 worked completely out. How it's set to start is that electric vehicles would 456 00:31:28,520 --> 00:31:33,000 could would and could volunteer in first. Why would they? I mean well how do you 457 00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:37,080 have a new tax or a charge that's voluntary? Because currently electric 458 00:31:37,080 --> 00:31:42,060 vehicles do pay an EV registration fee and the road usage charge while it's a 459 00:31:42,060 --> 00:31:46,440 per mile charge which is different than a flat fee will be paid similarly at 460 00:31:46,440 --> 00:31:52,120 the time of registration and so the idea is to get electric vehicles and I think 461 00:31:52,120 --> 00:31:56,320 the bill I should know this but the previous bill that I I think this is 462 00:31:56,320 --> 00:32:00,640 included in the current legislation to incentivize or to get the electric 463 00:32:00,640 --> 00:32:04,280 vehicle owners to to move over to the program and to begin voluntary 464 00:32:04,280 --> 00:32:10,600 voluntarily utilizing it I think their initial RUC charges are capped at their 465 00:32:10,600 --> 00:32:14,920 current EV fee right so they're so basically saying we're trying to move 466 00:32:14,920 --> 00:32:19,600 folks over and get get an idea for this and implement it we're not gonna make 467 00:32:19,600 --> 00:32:24,240 you initially pay more than your current EV fee I think that was at least a piece 468 00:32:24,240 --> 00:32:28,640 of the previous legislation. How are hybrid vehicles included? Are they the same as EVs? 469 00:32:28,640 --> 00:32:33,520 They will come in next because there is also a $75 hybrid vehicle fee 470 00:32:33,520 --> 00:32:39,080 currently so that fee for someone volunteering would go away now it gets a 471 00:32:39,080 --> 00:32:44,080 little trickier so right now obviously EVs no gas tax right right because they 472 00:32:44,080 --> 00:32:47,320 don't use gas that's pretty straightforward right I'm paying a per 473 00:32:47,320 --> 00:32:52,560 mile charge we're gonna keep track of how many miles I've driven and the rate 474 00:32:52,560 --> 00:32:57,800 is 2.6 cents per mile and there's a reasoning for that calculation if we have 475 00:32:57,800 --> 00:33:01,760 time for we can get into but that will that will calculate the rate and then I 476 00:33:01,760 --> 00:33:06,440 think like I said at least initially it's capped at your current EV okay 477 00:33:06,440 --> 00:33:09,600 that's a key that's a key piece that you just mentioned 2.6 cents per mile 478 00:33:09,600 --> 00:33:15,320 that's the rate for the road usage charge that's the road usage charge is 479 00:33:15,320 --> 00:33:19,240 that the same rate for everybody or is it just for electrical vehicles it is 480 00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:23,440 the same rate for everybody okay now let's get back to the high oil go ahead 481 00:33:23,440 --> 00:33:27,480 well but you also mentioned another thing is you have to keep track of how 482 00:33:27,480 --> 00:33:31,840 many miles you've driven so you can pay that rate I have a couple questions 483 00:33:31,840 --> 00:33:35,240 first of all do you pay it at the end of the year let me just say I hope I can 484 00:33:35,240 --> 00:33:38,960 answer your question okay do you pay it at the end of the year do you pay it at 485 00:33:38,960 --> 00:33:42,200 every month do you know is it a quarterly thing based on how many miles 486 00:33:42,200 --> 00:33:46,360 you've driven number one number two how do you keep track of it and number three 487 00:33:46,360 --> 00:33:51,120 what if you drive out of state or even out of country for a significant portion 488 00:33:51,120 --> 00:33:56,440 of you know your your mileage for instance how is that taken care of yes 489 00:33:56,440 --> 00:34:00,800 or considered so thank you for all those really technical challenging questions 490 00:34:00,800 --> 00:34:04,640 hey now listen inquiring minds want to know yes and for the listening public I 491 00:34:04,640 --> 00:34:08,280 am going to take a shot at answering those but I am going to reserve the 492 00:34:08,280 --> 00:34:13,320 right to be wrong and also I already said this the Transportation Commission 493 00:34:13,320 --> 00:34:17,600 has done a great job studying these questions and I have also said some of 494 00:34:17,600 --> 00:34:22,040 these were I think gonna kind of work out and and tweet it should the bill 495 00:34:22,040 --> 00:34:25,400 pass again that's why it's phased in involuntary is to see how the mechanics 496 00:34:25,400 --> 00:34:29,080 of this will work so let's try to remember your first question hey just 497 00:34:29,080 --> 00:34:33,200 for just for just for everyone's information though this is the County 498 00:34:33,200 --> 00:34:37,280 Connection podcast we're talking about political issues here the right to be 499 00:34:37,280 --> 00:34:40,640 wrong it's written in the fine print right when you subscribe to the podcast 500 00:34:40,640 --> 00:34:46,120 so everybody knows that going in okay just make sure all right so I think your 501 00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:50,960 first question is let's talk about the 2.6 and does everybody pay the 2.6 cents 502 00:34:50,960 --> 00:34:57,320 per mile right so for the road usage charge piece yes so so how do I pay it I 503 00:34:57,320 --> 00:35:01,360 think was your other question right so that a huge issue with this bill 504 00:35:01,360 --> 00:35:07,880 legitimate issue that gets raised is protecting privacy so the default that 505 00:35:07,880 --> 00:35:12,920 the Transportation Commission has recommended for reporting your miles and 506 00:35:12,920 --> 00:35:18,000 kind of working through that is an odometer reading so when it's time to 507 00:35:18,000 --> 00:35:22,520 re-register your vehicle you would go in and you would report your odometer 508 00:35:22,520 --> 00:35:27,520 reading at that time and that's I believe when the calculation happens so 509 00:35:27,520 --> 00:35:32,440 now let's just take the most basic case electric vehicle I'm currently paying no 510 00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:38,460 gas tax right I go in it's time to re-register okay what's your odometer 511 00:35:38,460 --> 00:35:44,860 reading it's this amount so a number times 2.6 right okay there's your ruck 512 00:35:44,860 --> 00:35:48,640 charge for this year now again in the phased-in approach I think their ruck 513 00:35:48,640 --> 00:35:52,640 charge for the EVs is initially capped it they can't go over what they would 514 00:35:52,640 --> 00:35:56,440 have paid for the EV fee I got to look into that and I hope I'm not passing bad 515 00:35:56,440 --> 00:36:00,400 information but that's how that I'll call it the most clean version with an 516 00:36:00,400 --> 00:36:05,600 electric vehicle paying no gas tax would happen now let's contrast that with your 517 00:36:05,600 --> 00:36:10,120 current you drive a current gas-powered vehicle now okay I'm gonna be in the road 518 00:36:10,120 --> 00:36:13,440 usage charge program I'm gonna start paying per mile but I still have to fill 519 00:36:13,440 --> 00:36:17,640 my vehicle up with gas right so I'm filling my vehicle up with gas I'm going 520 00:36:17,640 --> 00:36:21,760 going to work and stuff it's time to re-register my vehicle I go in same 521 00:36:21,760 --> 00:36:27,620 thing I report my odometer reading so 10,000 miles or whatever mm-hmm times the 522 00:36:27,620 --> 00:36:35,340 2.6 that is the road usage charge that I owe for $260 but I am credited the 523 00:36:35,340 --> 00:36:42,160 amount of gas tax I paid and the way you do that math problem is the same 524 00:36:42,160 --> 00:36:47,400 mileage against your vehicle you know the owner's manual and miles per gallon 525 00:36:47,400 --> 00:36:51,200 okay so let's so that's where it gets a little tricky and I think my car 526 00:36:51,200 --> 00:36:54,880 actually a more modern car though will actually tell you what miles per gallon 527 00:36:54,880 --> 00:36:57,840 you're getting they don't use that reading they're gonna have to use 528 00:36:57,840 --> 00:37:02,600 probably the manufacturers average right they got a they got to have a number 529 00:37:02,600 --> 00:37:09,200 okay so that will be your credit so I think it's this is and for me admittedly 530 00:37:09,200 --> 00:37:11,800 this has been a tricky part for me to understand because it's like well wait 531 00:37:11,800 --> 00:37:15,160 I'm still paying gas tax I don't then I'm paying well they just get rid of the 532 00:37:15,160 --> 00:37:19,080 gas tax there's a lot of again there's a lot of reasons for that there's federal 533 00:37:19,080 --> 00:37:22,560 gas tax there's yeah but they can get rid of the state portion of the gas tax 534 00:37:22,560 --> 00:37:25,840 so so let me let me slow down and let's work through these one at a time because 535 00:37:25,840 --> 00:37:30,540 we might get into that so the amount you've paid per your vehicles miles per 536 00:37:30,540 --> 00:37:34,600 gallon times the miles you've driven that's your credit on the road usage 537 00:37:34,600 --> 00:37:38,040 charge so you actually could owe zero right does that make sense 538 00:37:38,040 --> 00:37:43,120 yeah sure come in to register your gas tax paid credit might be more than your 539 00:37:43,120 --> 00:37:46,440 road usage charge at which point you just take your registration and you're 540 00:37:46,440 --> 00:37:51,840 good you might you don't get a refund no you know you might owe a little more so 541 00:37:51,840 --> 00:37:58,320 you might what I'm saying is if if my road usage charge was less than the gas 542 00:37:58,320 --> 00:38:02,920 tax I paid I don't get the difference back I don't believe so okay again a guy 543 00:38:02,920 --> 00:38:06,440 can we're talking through this I'm not I'm not the expert I have looked pretty 544 00:38:06,440 --> 00:38:10,580 hard at this stuff but okay so that that I what I tried to do there and hopefully 545 00:38:10,580 --> 00:38:14,400 I did it accurately was to talk about kind of the the easiest version which is 546 00:38:14,400 --> 00:38:20,320 a EV which pays no gas tax odometer reading times the 2.6 cents that's my 547 00:38:20,320 --> 00:38:26,040 road usage charge for the year versus I still own a gas-powered vehicle and 548 00:38:26,040 --> 00:38:30,520 again that's in the outer years I can't remember the schedule but not till you 549 00:38:30,520 --> 00:38:36,200 know late 2029 or something we start to bring in gas-powered vehicles now you 550 00:38:36,200 --> 00:38:39,960 are having to work through that credit situation you also asked me about out 551 00:38:39,960 --> 00:38:44,200 of state miles great question a lot of people have this question you know or you 552 00:38:44,200 --> 00:38:49,960 know or I'm I spent a lot of time on federal land or you know whatever maybe 553 00:38:49,960 --> 00:38:53,900 it's a work truck you know and you're a farmer and it's almost correct half or 554 00:38:53,900 --> 00:38:58,320 more of the miles are just on your own property so they the bill tries to 555 00:38:58,320 --> 00:39:01,680 account for those and certainly the Transportation Commission has thought 556 00:39:01,680 --> 00:39:05,840 about that and studied it I don't know that they believe they have a perfect 557 00:39:05,840 --> 00:39:09,260 solution for every one of those situations there is I think in the bill 558 00:39:09,260 --> 00:39:14,900 an automatic 200 mile deduction for what we might call out of so out-of-state 559 00:39:14,900 --> 00:39:19,400 miles so right off the top everybody who would be in the road user charge program 560 00:39:19,400 --> 00:39:24,760 as I understand it you get an automatic like 200 mile comes off of your per 561 00:39:24,760 --> 00:39:28,520 miles that you report because it might have been on a driveway or it might have 562 00:39:28,520 --> 00:39:32,800 been in Oregon or something like that that came up you know in questions and 563 00:39:32,800 --> 00:39:36,280 concerns because people could have a lot of examples around like that's great but 564 00:39:36,280 --> 00:39:39,520 it doesn't work you know one trip somewhere else could be more than 20 565 00:39:39,520 --> 00:39:44,560 miles sure so there are other things in the bill and certainly that we would 566 00:39:44,560 --> 00:39:49,160 want to work on moving forward to where you are able to account for those miles 567 00:39:49,160 --> 00:39:54,120 and then report them so you know I I drove this many miles because this was 568 00:39:54,120 --> 00:39:58,640 my job or whatever you know in Oregon and how does this affect private vehicles 569 00:39:58,640 --> 00:40:03,280 versus publicly owned vehicles like county fleets is it exactly the same I 570 00:40:03,280 --> 00:40:07,440 think so and I should have started there this is vehicles that are ten thousand 571 00:40:07,440 --> 00:40:11,840 pounds and under and weight so this actually the bill primarily passenger 572 00:40:11,840 --> 00:40:17,240 vehicles yeah passenger vehicles would not impact you know larger vehicles that 573 00:40:17,240 --> 00:40:20,920 are subject to you know weight fees and other things so that's another piece of 574 00:40:20,920 --> 00:40:23,900 this that so like for instance semi trucks and things like that they 575 00:40:23,900 --> 00:40:26,920 wouldn't be part of this correct at least not initially with this bill and 576 00:40:26,920 --> 00:40:32,040 again remember this bill is trying to take many many years of study and 577 00:40:32,040 --> 00:40:37,920 recommendations and slowly kind of incorporate and implement the beginning 578 00:40:37,920 --> 00:40:41,400 stages of those so interesting but aren't some of those larger vehicles 579 00:40:41,400 --> 00:40:45,320 actually a lot harder on the roads well you certainly could argue that yeah the 580 00:40:45,320 --> 00:40:48,640 more they weigh and that you know the miles driven and impact but but again 581 00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:51,920 they're paying weight fees there's other things going on there and I think you 582 00:40:51,920 --> 00:40:58,320 know there is study and plan to address that but this program in the bill starts 583 00:40:58,320 --> 00:41:01,520 off with vehicles ten thousand pounds in them okay so I guess we'll have to stay 584 00:41:01,520 --> 00:41:07,080 tuned on that I'm sure there's a lot more here as far as details and probably 585 00:41:07,080 --> 00:41:10,480 people have a ton of questions yes this is the this is the one time I'm glad we 586 00:41:10,480 --> 00:41:14,760 don't have a call in line because I think we'd be here forever but I want to 587 00:41:14,760 --> 00:41:18,000 get to other parts of this bill really quickly and we don't have a lot of time 588 00:41:18,000 --> 00:41:23,200 left but the one piece that I'm really interested in is how do counties benefit 589 00:41:23,200 --> 00:41:28,680 here how how do counties get revenue for their transportation system because the 590 00:41:28,680 --> 00:41:34,360 current system with motor view you know motor view motor vehicle fuel taxes I 591 00:41:34,360 --> 00:41:37,800 should just say gas tax yeah I know it you know that is shared with the 592 00:41:37,800 --> 00:41:42,480 counties right the the taxes are paid and we get a percentage of that are we 593 00:41:42,480 --> 00:41:46,280 gonna get a percentage of this road usage charge as well how's that gonna 594 00:41:46,280 --> 00:41:51,400 work yeah and and that's one of the reasons you know we care about this so 595 00:41:51,400 --> 00:41:55,920 much is from the standpoint that as the state's been looking at this decline in 596 00:41:55,920 --> 00:41:59,720 gas tax we have to pay attention to that too for the reasons I mentioned earlier 597 00:41:59,720 --> 00:42:03,920 we are very dependent on gas tax depending on your county will depend on 598 00:42:03,920 --> 00:42:09,440 the percentage that your budget relies on that but everybody very much relies 599 00:42:09,440 --> 00:42:14,920 on gas tax when it comes to county roads so with that being said our interest is 600 00:42:14,920 --> 00:42:23,000 making sure well let's start here too in I think 20 let's call it 2019 was maybe 601 00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:29,600 the peak of gas tax collections and so since then we've seen declines and there 602 00:42:29,600 --> 00:42:32,800 is a forecast and a projected decline certainly we're thinking we're gonna 603 00:42:32,800 --> 00:42:37,480 bring more electric vehicles online and that fuel efficiency through hybrids 604 00:42:37,480 --> 00:42:43,240 etc is going to continue to require less gas tax so the projected structural 605 00:42:43,240 --> 00:42:48,120 deficit for fuel tax is there and known and that's why we have an interest is 606 00:42:48,120 --> 00:42:52,560 because we can't allow our you know number one or two transportation revenue 607 00:42:52,560 --> 00:42:58,080 source to actually decline when nothing else we're seeing in terms of cost and 608 00:42:58,080 --> 00:43:01,880 need is doing the same thing so that's the problem statement it's very clear 609 00:43:01,880 --> 00:43:08,160 why this bill works for us is it it does it maintains the current fuel tax 610 00:43:08,160 --> 00:43:13,640 distributions for counties and for cities and and that's important to us we 611 00:43:13,640 --> 00:43:18,880 can continue to talk and debate whether that's enough or if that distribution is 612 00:43:18,880 --> 00:43:25,040 fair so the way that the gas tax is distributed now the new road usage charge 613 00:43:25,040 --> 00:43:30,540 will be distributed in the same way correct it maintains the distribution 614 00:43:30,540 --> 00:43:34,840 formulas that the current gas tax does now we know if it will generate more 615 00:43:34,840 --> 00:43:39,120 revenue or less revenue or the same amount of revenue it will and there's 616 00:43:39,120 --> 00:43:44,280 some nuance here people will say well if it's just replacing the gas tax but I 617 00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:48,160 also hear it's gonna generate more revenue you know there's a natural and 618 00:43:48,160 --> 00:43:53,360 maybe fair skepticism there but if you think about a current EVs are not paying 619 00:43:53,360 --> 00:43:59,080 it right so it's going to spread out and apply to more vehicles so as you add 620 00:43:59,080 --> 00:44:03,280 more vehicles and more vehicles are paying I'll call it their fair share it 621 00:44:03,280 --> 00:44:10,360 does increase the pool of revenue so the individual is not meant to pay more in 622 00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:15,600 gas tax but it will more fairly spread out who's paying gas tax and increase 623 00:44:15,600 --> 00:44:20,200 the number of people paying gas tax which will raise revenue over time now 624 00:44:20,200 --> 00:44:24,400 also we should say the legislature can change things and you know could change 625 00:44:24,400 --> 00:44:27,920 things in the future in terms of an increase I mentioned 2.6 cents per mile 626 00:44:27,920 --> 00:44:31,840 well that was gonna be my next question is how stable is that well it's it it's 627 00:44:31,840 --> 00:44:35,800 as stable as the current fuel tax right I mean they could change that if they 628 00:44:35,800 --> 00:44:38,520 want to yeah it feels like every time you turn around there's a new increase 629 00:44:38,520 --> 00:44:43,240 on the fuel tax so it and that hasn't been keeping up with the need so so yes 630 00:44:43,240 --> 00:44:47,160 it will I think at least with the current situation we have more fairly 631 00:44:47,160 --> 00:44:53,280 spread out who's paying for the road network so that was House Bill 1921 and 632 00:44:53,280 --> 00:44:58,060 has that had a hearing yet it did it was heard in the house last week I believe 633 00:44:58,060 --> 00:45:03,040 on Thursday and then it was just heard yesterday in Senate Transportation 634 00:45:03,040 --> 00:45:06,320 Committee meeting in the afternoon the Senate version which I don't have the 635 00:45:06,320 --> 00:45:09,680 bill off the top of my head all right so your prediction is this gonna pass this 636 00:45:09,680 --> 00:45:14,120 year well we'll see this bill I think came up I shouldn't say this bill a 637 00:45:14,120 --> 00:45:19,040 pretty different bill but a road usage charge bill came up in 2023 I believe 638 00:45:19,040 --> 00:45:24,200 and that did not obviously get through but you know we'll see where this is at 639 00:45:24,200 --> 00:45:30,560 I would expect House Bill 1921 will move out a committee and then you know from 640 00:45:30,560 --> 00:45:34,520 where it goes there I'm not sure I think you know there's a lot there's admittedly 641 00:45:34,520 --> 00:45:39,440 a lot of work to do with this idea in terms of what we're doing which is 642 00:45:39,440 --> 00:45:43,800 talking about it and kicking back and forth these questions and concerns and I 643 00:45:43,800 --> 00:45:48,200 think like I said the privacy issue some of the questions out-of-state travel 644 00:45:48,200 --> 00:45:52,280 there's good questions with regard to this policy change and the transition 645 00:45:52,280 --> 00:45:56,480 from a gas tax to a road usage charge I think where we're at is we're kind of 646 00:45:56,480 --> 00:46:00,560 settling in on the fact that a change does need to happen we can't keep going 647 00:46:00,560 --> 00:46:04,640 forward with a safe transportation system being funded by a declining 648 00:46:04,640 --> 00:46:08,440 revenue source so I think we're there as far as a change needs to happen I think 649 00:46:08,440 --> 00:46:12,920 what we like about this bill is the slow phased in voluntary approach it takes 650 00:46:12,920 --> 00:46:17,800 you know the ability to make some some tweaks and changes as you go but that 651 00:46:17,800 --> 00:46:22,360 being said absolutely acknowledged there are there are still questions and 652 00:46:22,360 --> 00:46:27,400 concerns with this and you know so if nothing else hearing on Tuesday hearing 653 00:46:27,400 --> 00:46:32,000 last week maybe some future hearings words getting out and people are having 654 00:46:32,000 --> 00:46:38,320 an opportunity to engage on the idea okay well Axel fascinating topic sounds 655 00:46:38,320 --> 00:46:42,200 to me like we're gonna have to be back here talking about it again it'll be 656 00:46:42,200 --> 00:46:47,000 interesting to see if it actually moves forward this session or if ultimately 657 00:46:47,000 --> 00:46:50,680 it's decided a lot more discussion and more analysis needs to take place I know 658 00:46:50,680 --> 00:46:54,560 they've been studying it for I think you said a decade or more I think since 659 00:46:54,560 --> 00:46:58,400 2012 they first got you know some direction to work on it I think people 660 00:46:58,400 --> 00:47:01,400 are still gonna have a lot of questions yeah yeah I agree well thanks for the 661 00:47:01,400 --> 00:47:07,400 chat today great topic very fascinating lots of in-depth analysis we look forward 662 00:47:07,400 --> 00:47:13,400 to talking to you about it again to them take care thanks Paul thanks for tuning 663 00:47:13,400 --> 00:47:16,920 in to County Connection stay in the loop by subscribing to us through your 664 00:47:16,920 --> 00:47:21,280 preferred podcasting app and following us on LinkedIn Facebook and Instagram 665 00:47:21,280 --> 00:47:24,880 and don't forget to join the hub your go-to source for the latest news and 666 00:47:24,880 --> 00:47:28,440 updates from the Washington State Association of Counties until next time 667 00:47:28,440 --> 00:47:48,120 stay connected and stay informed