business backgrounder | transportation
“Our members’ success depends on people being able to get
to work and goods being able to get to market,” Daudon told the
House Transportation Committee last March during AWB-led
testimony.
This transportation package will create jobs statewide for
generations to come, said Tacoma Pierce County Chamber
President Tom Pierson.
“We’ve been waiting 30 years to complete 167, which will
create 80,000 jobs,” Pierson told lawmakers as the bill was being
debated last year. “This keeps Washington globally competitive.”
“When we testified on the bill, we had a member from every
corner of the state — from Vancouver and Spokane to Tacoma,
Yakima and the Tri-Cities,” Ennis said.
Gov. Jay Inslee signed the package in a July 2015 ceremony
overlooking the 520 bridge, calling it “the largest single
investment in transportation in state history.”
ongoing support
The project is already beginning to help with gridlock and
improvement to commerce, but AWB’s involvement with the
package isn’t over.
During the 2016 legislative session, this fall’s general election,
and on into 2017, AWB’s government affairs team is working to
ensure that the projects and reforms in the package stay intact.
AWB’s Transportation Committee voted this spring to reaffirm
AWB’s support for the state’s last three major transportation
packages: the “nickel” package of 2003, the Transportation
Partnership Act in 2005 and the Connecting Washington package
of 2015. AWB’s committee recommends opposing anything that
takes away from these packages.
In short, AWB maintains its commitment to Washington’s
transportation packages, including reforms. “Our objective for the
– Microsoft President Brad Smith, speaking at the ribbonsession is to make sure the Legislature maintains its commitment
cutting on the new 520 floating bridge
to the package,” said Ennis. That means projects that are funded
need to stay funded, he said, and the $1.2 billion allocated for
maintenance and preservation can’t be diverted for other uses.
AWB is also committed to preserving the dozen-and-a-half reforms in the Connecting Washington package, including
permit streamlining for transportation projects and making congestion relief an official transportation goal.
There’s plenty of road ahead, and AWB is watching to make sure that the money and leadership needed to keep
Washington moving will be there as promised.
“Today a dream has come true. It's a day
to look forward and a day to be inspired.”
Connecting Washington
www.wsdot.wa.gov/Projects/Funding/CWA/
“Congestion and lack of investment has broad
implications for the ability of UPS to provide service
to our customers, our quality of life, and the state’s
economic competitiveness.”
— Kristal Fiser, director of state government affairs, UPS
42 association of washington business