So we have been recording, just so you know.
Okay. Let's go ahead and get started since you
are a no -nonsense guy today for whatever reason.
Welcome to County Connection. the official podcast
of the Washington State Association of Counties,
where we dive into the legislative issues shaping
the future of our communities. From budgets to
public safety, infrastructure to elections, we'll
break down what's happening in Olympia and how
it impacts counties from across the Evergreen
State. Stay informed, stay engaged, and join
us as we amplify the voice of Washington's 39
counties. Welcome, everybody, to the County Connection
podcast, the official podcast of the Washington
State Association of Counties. It is officially
the start of week three here at the legislative
session. I'm Paul Jewell, your legislative director
and host for the podcast. And we've got Axel
Swanson, our managing director for the Washington
State Association of County Engineers. Welcome
back, Axel, your first podcast of the session,
if I'm not mistaken. You're correct, Paul. Thanks
for having me here, and I'm looking forward to
the conversation and talking about how Session
has gotten started and how it's going so far.
Well, Axel, you are the everything transportation
guru. You're the roads and bridges guy, and I
know you keep a pretty sharp eye on what's going
on in the budgets, especially the transportation
budget, because let's face it, without... funding.
We're not doing new projects. We're not doing
maintenance. We're not making sure that our roads
are safe out there. Aside from what they are
now, we're certainly not improving the traffic
situation in Washington State, which is horrid,
as we all know. Anybody who's ever tried to drive
to Olympia on a weekday, especially during rush
hour, certainly has suffered along with the rest
of us. So what's going on in the budgets this
year? What can we look forward to? Yeah. So,
you know, thanks for the assessment. And I think
the assessment is true both. Sorry about that.
It's okay. It's not hard on county roads. Let's
be clear. Well, we'll get into that. So the state
obviously owns a good chunk of the transportation
system. But we focus, as you mentioned, on the
county -owned portion of the system. And we work,
I think, really well in conjunction with our
city partners also. And, you know, just for a
little bit of context for the listener, just
go quickly over the system so they kind of can
picture maybe in their mind what we're talking
about. But it is a large percentage, the majority
of the transportation system is owned by local
jurisdictions. Counties have 78 ,000 lane miles.
We own over 3 ,300 bridges. So for lane miles,
that's over 60 % or roughly 60 % of all the roads
in Washington state are owned by counties. And
in terms of bridges, we own about half, about
45 % of all bridges are owned by counties. And
then we also have four county owned and operated
ferry systems. So we are in the ferry business
like the state. So a huge chunk of this system
is owned, operated, managed by us at the county
level and the city level as well. So when you're
talking about the portion that counties own though,
and how we own 60 % of the lane miles, et cetera,
that is 60 % of the entire system. And so we
actually are responsible for and own more than
the cities and the state combined. Is that right?
Yeah, I think that's correct. I mean, it depends
on what you're talking about in terms of lane
miles, yes. So we own 60%. So that would be more
than half and more than both those combined.
Now, what we always have to acknowledge is there's
different types of system. infrastructure. And
so certainly the state is going to own the, you
know, larger freeways, the, the, the big bridges,
the high capacity stuff. And so they have more
average daily traffic on their portion of the
system and their system admittedly. while less
is very expensive. Yeah, I mean, it's not hard
to make that connection, right? When you look
at I -5, especially during rush hour traffic,
like I mentioned, versus, say, a county road,
even a county road that's fairly busy, it's just
no comparison with the number of cars that are
going to be on that pavement day after day, minute
after minute, hour after hour. Yep. And we I
think I mentioned our relationship with the cities.
I think we've been getting along very well with
who we work with more kind of a staff level,
although we've been fortunate and got to have
some meetings with the new secretary of transportation.
And so the regional our regional partners at
Washed Out, I think we all work together, you
know, and we'll get into this maybe a little
bit with a December storm that occurred, I think.
During emergencies, I think you always have that
opportunity to see the best in folks and how
they respond and work together. And so I heard
several accounts in the last weeks and months
about how the jurisdictions were pulling together
and working together during that storm event.
It feels like that's actually getting better,
too. Like that whole system of collaboration
and sharing of resources, especially during emergencies,
has been getting better. Really, you know, it
feels like we've been making a lot of progress
maybe over the last two or three decades. You
know, I can remember not that long ago a lot
of stories about different jurisdictions kind
of fighting, right, over authorities and territory
and, you know, whose job is what when some of
those really big issues or emergencies would
happen. And it feels like a lot of that's being
set aside right now for collaboration and that
the system's getting better. Are you getting
the same sense? Yeah, I think so. You know, and
you and I have both been around for similar amounts
of time kind of working for counties. And so
it's hard to, you know, you know what you know.
So I think back to like some of the things we've
had to work through with the state and or cities
like the recession, COVID. And, you know, so
maybe there's some things where, you know, people
like us who are, you know, still working and
in our career and we've worked, you know. We've
had those opportunities where there was no choice
but to pull together. So I guess the lines of
communication are there and some of the people
are there and remember that. And I think that's
good. You know, we haven't had a podcast since
that December storm happened. that you've been
on and so if we could i just want to maybe ask
a couple of quick questions about about that
or maybe get an assessment from you on that how
would you how would you rate that event compared
to other kind of seasonal major storms that we've
seen in the past i mean you've been around for
a while you were a county commissioner for uh
at least one term you've worked for counties
ever since whether it's you know, for Wasak or
for Clark County or for Cowlitz County. So you've
been, this isn't your first rodeo, so to speak,
and you've certainly been in the transportation
business for a while. How would you rate kind
of the impact and the damage that counties faced
during that storm? Is it kind of typical for
an event that size or was it more severe, do
you think? Well, as you know, they're all different.
And you're right, I have been around for a while,
and particularly as it relates to where I live
and close to home. So I'm in southwest Washington.
I live near the Cowlitz River. It rains a little
bit down there. It rains a lot down there. And
that river is heavily influenced by, still influenced
by the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens. And
so a big part of my job for a lot of my career
was paying attention to flood protection levels.
and understanding, you know, what might happen
during different events. And so I guess when
that system came in, it hit southwest Washington
really hard for, you know, almost 48 hours. So
Lewis County, you know, you kind of saw a lot
of impacts there. A lot of power outages. Where
I lived. Lock roads, flooding. Standing water
and kind of a grim outlook. And then the system
pushed north. And you saw probably what was impacted
worse was our colleagues and friends up in Snohomish
County, Whatcom County. And it stayed there a
little bit longer, and it got really scary. The
levels that you were seeing for potential crests
up there were records, and we didn't see records
down our way in southwest Washington. When you
say crest, you're talking about the river levels.
Yeah, where it was predicted to crest in terms
of historic crests. And those are important when
we're talking about flood impacts, potential
flood impacts, things like that. Yeah. And that's
what I'll always look for. You know, so there's
river gauges on all of our rivers. And so you
can kind of. check if you're interested it's
kind of interesting to me but you know go back
and check what the historic crests have been
versus kind of where the predicted model's going
and that's kind of how you can try to see 24
hours to 72 hours out at where things are going
to be or you know if they're going to keep going
up or coming down so yeah that was a it was a
very spooky uh forecasted storm because it started
in the southwest and moved up into northwest
washington it kind of split And I don't think
we ended up as bad as we could have if it had
just stayed in one position or location for the,
you know, four or five days. It would have been
really awful. And also, I think we've done a
lot of good work over time to sort of build resiliency
and infrastructure and, you know, to make the
infrastructure that we have as we put it back
better. And I think you saw some of that stuff,
particularly up in Skagit County, you know, some
of the... some of the things that were done to
protect the community. So bad storm in places,
it was historic. In other places, I think they
avoided the worst. And, you know, we can get
into some specific damage numbers, but I've really
appreciated the response by everybody to include
the transportation chairs. And they're interested
and had us actually present on this last week,
last Thursday night in Senate. Transportation
Committee and asked us to survey the membership
for how they were doing and what their storm
damage costs were and what their needs are. And
so we continue to work on that. And I think that's
appreciated. Yeah. And it's nice that the state
legislature is engaged in that conversation as
well and kind of considering that. I'm glad we
had a chance to talk about that. You know, in
today's world, we just have more people in Washington
state. We have more stuff in the way. And so
there's always going to be those impacts as well,
because. Maybe there wasn't a road there before.
Maybe people weren't living in a particular area
before. But with population growth and development,
a lot of that has changed. So it's just good
to kind of calibrate, I guess, on how bad the
impacts really were. So I appreciate that perspective.
What do you want to talk about next? Do you want
to talk about what you're seeing in the budget
as far as kind of, you know, informing our listeners
on what the state's thinking about transportation
investments in the next couple of years. Well,
I guess right now we're just looking at next
year. Yep. It's a short session supplemental
budget. So we've got a two -year transportation
budget. So we're, I mean, you know how this works.
Maybe listeners aren't as familiar with the process,
but we're not taking big swings here or trying
to, you know, really change something. substantial.
We're trying to build upon what's in there and
then adjust things that we've noticed might be
a problem or an error. Well, we're already a
third of the way through the process at this
point too, right? It happens fast, right? No
matter how many times you do this, I haven't
done this, when I say this, the legislative process
and being sort of on the advocacy side specifically,
it's hard to... It's hard to explain the pace
a short session particularly happens at. Yeah.
And you kind of, you go in thinking about that
and you remember, but then it happens and you're
like, you know, it just, it is. It's like trauma
in your life. You bury it in the back of your
mind until the next one comes along. There's
just so many things happening at once that are
important and nobody wants to, you know, look
like they don't know what they're talking about.
And these are. complicated topics and you're
racing around and people are asking for information
and you're trying to respond. It is a tremendous
pace. So that being said, back to your question,
there are some really important things in terms
of conversations for the transportation budget.
The governor's proposal came out, so we evaluated
that. The highlight in there for counties is...
In this two -year budget, we were able – so preservation
and maintenance of the system, we started with
that, right? We have the biggest, largest chunk
of the statewide system. We've got to maintain
it. We've got to keep it in good working order.
I feel like we're always talking about that.
We are. It's always going to be our priority
besides just transportation safety and trying
to improve the safety of it. But I'll tell you,
the preservation of the system, it's getting
– to a point where it's creating safety problems,
and certainly you hear that from the Department
of Transportation. So we had Chair Fye, the House
Transportation Committee chair, he will remind
us often that there were no new programs. It
was a tough budget last year for them. There
were no new programs with new money put into
the budget except for... a new program at the
County Road Administration Board. So we were
proud of that. We were proud of the recognition
that the legislature gave to the county side
of the system. And they put a new program for
local access roads into the budget. They didn't
fund it until 27. So it's not funded until the
next biennium at $20 million a year. The governor's
proposal approved a decision package by the county
road administration board to put 2 .2 million
into 26 so that we could get the program started
so you know you gotta You've got to have somebody
manage the program. You've got to solicit for
designs and kind of get that first call for projects
out there. So last year they approved the program,
which if anyone's interested, we did a deep dive
on that, both with you and with Jane Wall from
Crab. If you want to go back to our library of
episodes earlier last year, you can find some
more information on that. But that program was
passed. You're saying they didn't fund it until
2027, but the governor has said. Let's get it
started. Here's some, would you call it seed
money? Yeah, sure. Startup funds maybe? Yeah.
And that's how much? 2 .6 million? 2 .2 million.
2 .2 million. Would be available in 26. And that
was that local, like local access roads, right?
Local roads, yeah. And that's important because
that's the vast majority of our... county -owned
roads, and there is no current grant program
through the state or the federal government for
those roads. So you're just completely relying
on your local road fund. And so that'd be a big
win. And for those of you or those listeners
who maybe aren't as familiar with some of the
road terms, roads are classified into different
categories like main arterials and things like
that. What is a local access road? Just really
quickly. Yeah, I don't want to get too much into
the tiers and the R1s and the different things.
But you would think of it as like not necessarily
like a – it could be up to like a small collector
but like more of a neighborhood kind of a road.
And you know what we should do? We should kind
of pause this section because I think you should
have Jane come back in. And she does a wonderful
presentation. In fact – I've seen her give the
presentation recently to the Senate Transportation
Commission, but talk about how they're going
to set up and establish. this program and we
can talk about maybe some of the other things,
but it probably makes sense for the listeners
just to hear it right from the County Road Administration
Board. Yeah, that sounds good. Because they've
got it all laid out and some great visual aids
as well that show just how many of these roads
are all over the state. Well, believe it or not,
the episode with Jane Wall last year was one
of the more popular. I don't know if your members
all jumped in on the downloads or whatever it
was, or if Jane just has that. podcast charisma.
I don't know, but we'll try to get her back in
here and we'll talk about that. I'm sure that's
the one thing she'll want to talk about. Yeah.
So you, so there's some funding for that in the
budget. What else is there funding for? And so
a couple of other things that we'll be looking
for in budget. So I, as mentioned, I, I, we're
talking a lot about transportation roads, but
I focus on the capital budget as well in some
different areas. You can't have 78 ,000 miles
of roads and not have a lot of fish. barriers
so those are culverts running you know we have
to try to keep the the water moving underneath
the roadway and in the past over time we've got
you know we haven't done that so well and we've
got a lot of corrections to made so make so we
focus a lot on the funding that goes to local
governments to repair and replace Those culverts
that are fish barriers, and so we focus on the
Brian Abbott fish barrier removal boards, prioritized
list. We'll be looking for that. It was funded
in the biennium at $30 million, but they need
$70 million to get down the list. And so we'd
like to see an additional $40 million come to
the board there to do those prioritized projects.
Boy, an additional $40 is a big ask in a short
session, especially given the fiscal constraints
that the state is dealing with. What do you think
your chances are? Hard to say. But what I would
tell anyone who will listen is, I don't want
to be flippant about it, like I say, it's not.
But if you look at the gain and the benefit of
those projects and the amount of habitat that
those projects will open up compared to where
we're spending much more. not in my opinion,
in reality, than $40 million around the state
on important projects that are barriers, but
much more expensive and opening up much less
habitat or potentially having blockages upstream
and downstream. You're talking about some of
the WSDOT projects that are going on right now
to fulfill the court order around the lawsuit
that, what was that, 2018, 2019? Yeah, correct.
So there is a mediation going on to hopefully
open up, I don't know, I'm not involved in that,
but, you know, to open up some flexibility on
where the remainder of funds, you know, that
would go to replace the existing blockages that
are still subject to the court order, where that
would go. We're interested in that because we
have a lot of these barriers, so do the cities.
And, you know, there's an urgency to this, right,
because there's limited time and there's limited
money. And it just keeps getting more expensive.
And it does. And what's good is our inventory
is getting better. We know more about the barriers
and where they're at. We have prioritized watersheds.
And so our data and information is getting better.
And my hope is that we can start prioritizing
and directing more funds downstream to get some
of this stuff, some of this habitat opened up.
So anyhow. Going back to the fish boards prioritized
list of projects, I think it's a good list. I
think that those projects are, you know, likely
more heavily vetted for criteria, you know, than
any other projects around the state currently.
So I just, I think it's 40 million, you're right.
It looks like a big number. But in terms of,
I think, value add for fish and for the habitat
and getting fish upstream, I think they're great
projects. Also, the governor's proposal, so other
infrastructure, we obviously care a lot about
water and sewer and just kind of that basic foundational
infrastructure that's important to everything.
So the Public Works Assistance Account and the
Public Works Board's traditional program is something
we always focus in on. Unfortunately, in the
governor's proposed operating budget, there's
an additional $75 million. So what they'll do
is if they see a fund balance there in the public
works assistance account, which is the four dedicated
revenues that fund the public works board's traditional
loan programs, they'll take that balance. And
so they've used $75 million additional from that
account to help balance the operating budget
for the state. Now, is that in addition to the
$288 million that they took last year from that
account? Last year's two -year budget for the
Public Works Board, we ended up being pretty
good with it. We would like to see it. Wasn't
it around $300 million or so? Yeah, it was over
that. It was closer to $350 million. And they
were able to fund their way through the traditional
program. And so we ended up in an okay spot with
the budget in terms of the traditional program
and what it could do. But, of course, our request
is always that. you know, leave those dedicated
revenues where they are. There's, there's, you
know, it's, it's an over solicited program. There's
a need out there for infrastructure. So, you
know, and, and, and the thing, I think there's
just a lot of, I think people could understand
this more and then, you know, it would be a little
bit easier of an ask each year, but the programs
pay themselves back. Nobody's ever defaulted.
And so these are loan programs. Yeah. For the
most part. I mean, they've opened it up a little
bit to grants, but. For the vast majority of
these projects, you're really just helping out
smaller towns and communities largely to get
a very low interest rate to maintain and replace
and repair their critical infrastructure, water
and sewer. This is essentially public money for
public projects that just kind of rinses and
repeats, right? You know, I'm a town. I need
a sewer line project or I need a new lift station
or I need, I don't know, a bridge. It could be
a bridge project. It could be all kinds of things.
I apply. I qualify. I get the money. I pay that
back. And then that goes back into the fund for
others to then take additional loans. And we
get, what, a 1 % or 2 % interest rate on that?
Yep, kind of can depend on a few things. There's
criteria, but it's certainly going to be a lower
interest rate than what you would get, you know,
out on the market. Right. And that's kind of
the idea here. And so I've gotten asked before,
and it gets, all this stuff is, you know, a little
bit complicated, but you'll get asked, like,
it's, you know, well, this isn't going to increase
taxes for, you know, and so sometimes we'll confuse,
like, a rate with a tax. And there is an important
distinction, but it... For me, what I like to
tell people is, you know, if you live in a town
or a community and your town or, you know, your
jurisdiction has a water district, let's say,
and you've got to, you know, replace a main line
or a bunch of the infrastructure for that, then,
correct, it's not a tax, but you're going to
pay a higher rate if you have to get a higher
interest loan. Well, of course you will. And
so it acts, I guess, in a way like a tax. And
so, you know. That's why this is a great program.
It repays itself. It keeps those rates down for
those people that are living in those communities,
and it keeps the infrastructure good. Axel, if
everybody's repaying the loans and you have dedicated
funding coming into the Public Works Assistance
account to make the loans, what's the long -term
impact of these? of these transfers to the operating
fund, do they have a long -term impact or is
it just short -term on the ability for the Public
Works Board to offer? more money to projects
for the next year or two or three. What's kind
of that net impact? I mean, it feels like with
dedicated funding and the money coming back in
from loans that have been made, the funds should
just be getting bigger and bigger and bigger
and bigger and bigger. And we should be able
to put more and more and more infrastructure
improvements out there. And Lord knows we need
it. It's not just new stuff. You talked about
preservation and maintenance. That's not just
with roads, right? That's with pumps and pipes
and everything else that we're doing as well.
And the state wants us to increase development
in more compact zones. And so you need to upgrade
systems to handle that development as well as
replace aging systems. All of this infrastructure
that's out there, it feels like there's never
enough money for it. So what is the long -term
impact of the legislature actually scooping up
these large amounts of money and putting it into
ongoing programs? So I'm going to answer your
question a little bit, and then I'm going to
– it was a big football weekend this weekend,
so then I'm going to punt. And I'm going to suggest
– We didn't see a lot of punts this weekend.
That's right, a lot of offense. But I think I
would suggest you doing this just like what we
mentioned earlier on the Local Roads program
with Jane, but have Maria Jawad from the Public
Works Board come over here because she's going
to give the listeners such a better answer on
your kind of very specific technical question
about how – what I can tell you is – When the
legislature looks to the public works assistance
account, what the revenues have brought in and
what the fund balance is, and then starts making
these decisions about moving that around, it
creates this secondary issue, which is where
we are, which is the question you just asked.
How is that going to impact what's in the account
for the traditional program? And how do we make
that all work moving forward? Because you're
right, there's... the revenues that come into
the account from different places. So we're talking
about kind of like a utility tax or revenue that
comes in, but then there's the repayments that
come in. Right. So there's kind of like this
constant looking at like, okay, where, how are
we going to cover things with the repayments
that we expect to come in? Right. And then what
additional will these revenues bring in and what's
the total pot and, you know, kind of this. When
these sweeps, like, oh, well, $288 million out
of the biennium, and then, well, looks like things
are coming in this way, so we'll add $75 million
to that. It just leads to this conversation every
year about the security of the program overall,
let alone maybe the individual project that's
been already appropriated out there and is dependent
on those revenues being there. But I'll stop
there. I think it would be a great discussion
with Maria on that and how they're... How they
work through it. Because if we're being honest,
right, you and I, again, we've been around a
while. Yeah. This is an every biennium, if not
year thing where we're talking about. The legislature
really has been looking at this as kind of like
every time they have a shortfall, they kind of
start looking over the fence at the public works
assistance account. It feels like it is their
go -to move every time. It is definitely one
of the ideas that's always on the short list.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, what else is going on in the
budget? I think, you know, I think that that
probably covers budget stuff. Well, well, there's
there's a couple of other we could probably do
a whole podcast, you know, and I don't know how
much detail we want to go into this. But you
and I have had some discussions and there's certainly
discussions that are ongoing about. a motor vehicle
fuel tax calculation error. So that, yeah, that
dates back a long time. I feel like we need another,
look at this. We're, we're making a whole list
of other podcasts. I feel like we need a whole
one on that one, that issue alone. There is a
lot there and maybe we'll be in a place in a,
in a few weeks or a month or so on that one where
we could do a deeper dive. But I mean, the short
story there is to, you know, to no one's fault
necessarily. The gas tax formulas and distribution
formulas are complicated, and so there was an
error discovered, and it dates back quite a while.
So the question has kind of become, okay, if
we settle in on an understanding of kind of what
this amount was that was supposed to be distributed
to counties over time. How can we, should we
correct that moving forward? And so, yeah, again,
probably a better conversation for a future podcast,
but. But you are in talks at this point to try
to find some solutions to that issue. Yeah. Are
we going to see something this year, do you think?
Will it be in the transportation budget? I mean,
I think that would be our hope, but we've got
some important communication to do, I think,
before that happens, both with legislators and
with our membership and, you know, just kind
of. working through the concept and the idea
right now, I think we're getting pretty, we're
getting to a good place with like a shared understanding
of the area that occurred and the amounts and
the problem. So kind of more to come on that
one, but it is part of sort of the overall transportation
budget question. Well, Axel, I got to tell you,
it feels like we've only been here for five minutes
and have only started to scratch the surface,
but we're actually at our time. We've actually
been going at this for almost a half an hour,
if you could believe it. I had no idea that transportation
talk could go by so quickly. Well, we didn't
even hit on any bills, so we'll have to do another
one. Yeah, we'll have to have you back. We'll
do another one on bills. It's been kind of a
wild ride so far, and we'll just have to see
what happens. what happens in the next couple
weeks. Believe it or not, like I said, we're
at the start of the third week already. The first
policy cutoff is just around the corner. It's...
Next Wednesday, I believe. So we're talking February
4th. Yeah, 10 days from today, if you count today.
So it's just around the corner. That's how fast
things move during a short session. We'll have
to get you back pretty soon, pretty quickly to
update us on some bills, maybe right around the
time that that cutoff is occurring. So we know
what's moving forward for the rest of the session
and what people need to get serious about. Yeah,
I think that makes a lot of sense coming in around
the cutoff. We'll talk about some transportation
and some procurement. Okay. Bills. Sounds good.
Well, thanks for stopping by today, Axel. And
are you going to give me a Go Hawks? Go Hawks.
It's Super Bowl. Go Hawks. All right. Thanks,
Axel. Thanks for tuning in to County Connection.
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