Mayor explores new funding route for road work

Seattle residents have voted to raise taxes again and again, topping off their bills with levies for ambitious projects.

Since 1998, voters have passed five levies: $117 million for education, $86 million for low-income housing, $72 million for the Seattle Center and community centers, $198 million for parks and $167 million for fire-fighting facilities.

The result is a four-fold increase over the past 10 years in what the average homeowner pays for levies. The owner of the average home in Seattle 10 years ago paid $104 for voter-approved levies. This year, the owner of the average home — assessed at $399,200 — will owe $459.

Today, Mayor Greg Nickels is expected to propose a new levy and other taxes — not for shiny new buildings, but to repair roads and bridges. His citizen advisory committee has suggested a levy of $25 million a year, and Nickels may choose to go higher.

"The need is clear, not only for the routine work of paving streets but also for the bigger projects, such as our aging bridges," Nickels said in his State of the City speech in March when he announced that he would explore a new way to fund repairs.

In 20 years, city voters have turned down only three of 13 proposed levies. Two of those defeated were for the Seattle Commons project. Nickels is so confident of voter support that he has hinted at the possibility of a levy that would never expire.

If voters in the fall approve a $25 million annual levy, the levy portion of the average homeowner's tax bill would jump 23 percent to almost $564, based on current property assessments.

"I have huge concerns" about another levy, said Councilman Peter Steinbrueck. "Over the last several years, we've added taxes for libraries, community spaces, housing. We're only just coming out of that period."

The new road-repair levy would signal a departure from how Seattle has used levies in the past. Previous levies were sold to the voters like Procter & Gamble products — offering something new and improved, such as new parks, fire stations and community centers.

This levy would improve roads but not pay for any new ones. The money would fill potholes, repaint crosswalks, repave roads — in other words, pay for tasks voters have come to expect government to include in its general budget.

The city's transportation department says it has a $500 million maintenance backlog and that 29 percent of roads are in fair to very poor condition. Nickels also wants to use the levy to fix bridges, sidewalks and bike paths. The money would not be used to repair or rebuild the Alaskan Way Viaduct.

Observers say voter-approved levies, which allow cities to raise property taxes for specific projects, likely will be used more often to fund routine maintenance, since Initiative 747, approved by voters in 2001, limited property-tax growth to 1 percent a year.

Nickels said the city needs new money for road repairs to make up for funding that used to come from the state.

"Ten years ago, the city of Seattle got $37.5 million of dedicated transportation funding" from state sources, Nickels said at an open house to discuss transportation needs. "This past year, we had $12 million."

Total transportation spending has increased in that period, from $44.8 million to $76 million this year, with the city using its general fund to replace state funding.

Nickels said transportation funding from the state has fallen because the vehicle-license fee was repealed, the state Supreme Court overturned the street-utility fee, and gas-tax revenue has been spread thinner as more cities were incorporated.

State Senate Transportation Chairwoman Mary Margaret Haugen, D-Camano Island, said she was "aghast" at Nickels' complaints about state funding. In the $8.5 billion gas-tax package the state passed in 2005, Seattle received $2.8 billion for projects like the viaduct and the 520 bridge, and an additional $2 million a year for maintenance, she said.

"The largest share certainly went to Seattle," Haugen said. "That was one of the things that people had heartburn about in the rest of the state."

Councilman Steinbrueck said a new property tax is the wrong way to fund road repairs because it targets property owners instead of drivers. He wants the city instead to start a tax on downtown parking lots, which the mayor is expected to also recommend.

The city is "nearing taxpayer fatigue," Steinbrueck said.

Councilwoman Jan Drago, chair of the transportation committee, and Nickels have both suggested eliminating one of the current levies to reduce the taxpayer load. Both have suggested not renewing the Seattle Center and community-centers levy that expires in 2007, for instance.

At open houses to discuss a new transportation levy, many residents sounded supportive.

C.O. Dahl, who lives in Queen Anne, said he would vote for the funding package "if the right concept came up." The tax burden, he said, is "bearable."

Some residents were collecting signatures to raise taxes just in their neighborhood to build a sidewalk on their street.

A few residents have voiced opposition.

Faye Garneau, head of the Aurora Avenue Merchants Association, said city roads are "beginning to look like a third-world city," but she would not support new taxes to pay for repairs.

"That's what your tax dollars are supposed to do, is maintain your city," she said.

Sharon Pian Chan: 206-464-2958 or schan@seattletimes.com