Olympia Gridlock

Never mind.

Remember all that talk about transportation being the No. 1 issue of the year in Olympia? How they were going to come up with a bipartisan solution and lift the issue above political gridlock and campaign-style rancor?

Well, it didn’t happen.

It went splat, a dispiriting coda to lawmakers’ most deflating, discouraging, discombobulating session in a long, long time. And the ugly and personal way it imploded left scars on the institution that will be hard to heal.

Some are already calling it the worst session in state history, both in terms of productivity and civility – and at a time when the Legislature and Gov. Gary Locke were desperately trying to reconnect with turned-off voters and ward off legislation-by-initiative.

After getting high-centered over transportation early in the session, lawmakers never were able to maneuver around the political potholes like taxes, urban-rural rifts and deep partisan differences.

There are many explanations for the meltdown, many of them actually true, but the most important one is the simplest: In a town where the two parties have a virtual tie in both houses, the partisan chasm was simply too wide to bridge. The rift also reflected the geopolitics of Puget Sound versus the rest of the state.

Transportation spending, blessed by bipartisan rubber stamp in previous generations, was scrutinized as never before and became politicized this year. The tie in the House and the Republicans’ stance against taxes apparently doomed the deal from the get-go, with the negotiators apparently the last people on the planet to see this.

The tough issue came along when the Legislature was seemingly least equipped to deal with intractable problems. Transportation was just the tip of the policy iceberg.

Examples? Legislators also failed to deal with the state primary, though they were bailed out last week by a friendly federal judge. They punted on the No. 1 education bill of the year, a plan for dealing with failing schools. And they barely avoided shutting down state government by their tardy passage of the budget.

To be sure, they had hardships and diversions galore – an economic slowdown, Boeing moving its headquarters to Chicago, an earthquake that forced Locke and lawmakers from the Capitol for weeks, a drought and energy crunch, a public employee strike, expensive new voter spending mandates, and, above all, political gridlock.

These guys must have been very, very bad in a past life.

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BLAME TO GO AROUND…

The fallout, besides deeper traffic congestion and escalating costs, will be political and institutional. A high-decibel, intemperate Blame Game began Wednesday even before the closing gavels fell, putting lawmakers out of their misery after a wretched, near-record 163 days.

Locke, inherently courteous and mild-mannered, went ballistic, blaming House Republicans for “screwing” the state economy and commuters with reckless regard. Most other Democrats piled on.

House Co-Speaker Clyde Ballard, R-East Wenatchee, who played the role of the heavy as the No. 1 conservative in a town dominated by centrists, seemed taken aback by the fierceness of the attack. In turn, he portrayed his caucus as the last defender of the taxpayer and accused Locke and the Democrats of unprincipled abandonment of a promise to place the tax package on the ballot.

And so it went.

Veteran Sen. Dan McDonald, R-Bellevue, perturbed at the harsh edge of the Democrats’ post-mortem, urged his colleagues on both sides to cool it. “There was enough intransigence on both sides to go around.”

House Transportation Co-Chairwoman Maryann Mitchell, R-Federal Way, caught between the more liberal Senate and House Democrats on the one hand and her skeptical House GOP caucus on the other, said “In the days ahead, it’s important that the partisan bickering and name-calling stop.

“It’s trivial political games like these that ruined the peoples’ trust in government to begin with,” Mitchell said. “It’s important to remember that the people you blame in the heat of politics today are the same people you’ll have to sit across the table from tomorrow.”

Most of the political establishment, including the business-labor coalition that bled for a solution approved in Olympia, sided with the Democrats’ reading that Ballard and Co. were the sole reason nothing passed.

It’s true that Ballard offered half the votes needed to pass a package – but on GOP terms. First, they held out for months for reforms in highway contracting, including lower mandatory wages in rural areas. Then they demanded a supermajority two-thirds vote for part of the package. And, above all, they demanded that it go to the ballot.

The Democrats, furious and often thrown off-guard, accused the GOP of constantly moving the goalposts and of cleverly disguising a secret agenda to keep lawmakers from taking a tax vote at all.

Plenty of folks, though, particularly tax critics, radio talk show aficionados, and people who live outside the congestion area, were happy with the standoff.

Former state Sen. Gary Strannigan, R-Everett, president of Citizens for a

Sound Economy, called it “good news times two” that taxpayers began receiving federal tax rebates last week and that “our state legislators won’t be reaching into taxpayers’ pockets” for billions in highway taxes.

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WHAT’S NEXT?

Two points:

1. The transportation issue promises to play a huge role in the fall special elections to determine control of the state House – and will usher in a brutal 2002 election cycle.

In two Snohomish County House districts, Republicans will portray the GOP as the last line of defense for the taxpayer, since the Senate and the governor’s mansion already are controlled by the Democrats. The Democrats surely will paint the GOP as the spoilers and gridlock merchants.

2. The issue itself, of course, won’t go away. The experts say traffic congestion, particularly in the Puget Sound basin, is among the very worst in the country. The Department of Transportation has a backlog of well over $100 billion worth of projects and only $50 billion worth of revenue projected to come in over the next 20 years.

What happens?

Locke and negotiators will try to create a regional plan for Snohomish, King and Pierce counties so local voters can decide whether to tax themselves to begin work on mega-projects on Interstate 5, I-405, highways 167 and 520, the Alaskan Way Viaduct and others.

Best bet: It won’t happen this year.

The issue will be front and center in the 2002 session, with a built-in reason to avoid doing anything – the 2002 elections. The so-called Congestion Caucus, legislators who support and need a transportation package, still aren’t a majority in Olympia, so it’s a decidedly uphill battle.

Two other possibilities:

1. Business and labor folks talk about running an initiative, bypassing Olympia, a la Tim Eyman. They’d still have the task of persuading taxpayers to nick themselves, though. The polls are daunting. People want a solution and people don’t want to pay.

2. Already, there’s talk of changing tactics next year. Some people in the administration and the Legislature say the big lesson of ’01 is that a huge, comprehensive, expensive package will never fly, either in Olympia or on the ballot, and that it’s time to adopt an incremental approach, and assume a public vote will be needed.

That would mean put a skinnied-down version on next year’s ballot, to be followed up every few years with another installment.

Stay tuned. This is the first big issue of the new century, unfolding on a freeway – and ballot box – near you.

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