Sultan Police Chief Fred Walser, along with a fairly large group of government officials and associates from the city, county and state, held a "revival" meeting Tuesday night (1-21-03) to inject new life into the Safety Coalition. The purpose of the meeting was, in part, to brainstorm an economical, short-term safety fix for the light at Old Owen/Main Street where 16-year-old Jolene Falstich was killed last December), and to enlarge Highway 2's capacity. Walser said, "We are resolved to redirect attention to Highway 2. Our goal is to galvanize and refocus support to improve highway capacity."

Walser said there were 112 crashes within a one-mile area of milepost 14, and that Rt. 2 has recently been designated the "third worst" highway in the state.

In attendance were: Snohomish County Councilman John Koster, Monroe Mayor Donetta Walser, Snohomish County Public Works' Doug McCormick, Rinker Materials (Cadman gravel) public affairs representative Liz Loomis, Monroe Councilman Jeff Fry, Sultan Mayor C. H. Rowe, Sultan Councilman Perry McPherson, Sultan Public Works Director Connie Dunn, EDC Sultan Liaison Carolyn Eslick, Berryman & Heniger engineer Jeff Kreschel and Samuel Richard from W&H Pacific (working on SBR-Rt. 2 intersection), Washington State Patrol Robert Lenz, Distr. Commander for local WSP, and others. (Our apologizes to anyone we omitted; I know there were more present.)

Walser gave a brief background on the birth of the Coalition and their success in gaining cooperation with the state to install safety improvements (left turn-outs and left-turn lanes) in high-accident areas. The Coalition initiated improvements such as those at Fern Bluff Road, where three people were killed within a 6-month timeframe, one of which was an employee of Chief Walser.

The key to the Coalition's success will be to "bug the heck" out of legislators in Olympia. John Koster said when he was a legislator in Olympia for six years, he found that, "The squeaky wheel gets the grease. It's just that simple. You need to sell this to Olympia." (That was echoed by Transportation Secretary Doug MacDonald at an ESCCC meeting in early 2002. Secretary MacDonald said, "I don't see people from here "screaming in Olympia" about the conditions on Rt. 2.) Koster also said the Safety Coalition was very diligent in making their presence felt in Olympia several years ago, one big reason the state coughed up needed funding for safety improvements.

When asked about the Monroe 522/Rt. 2 bypass, Monroe Mayor Walser said her conversations with state representatives and our representatives in Congress have come up against a brick wall. One representative actually told her that to achieve success, she needed "to be one of the good old boys." She said the "blue sky" construction date is 2011, but feels that date was selected sort of like a "budget bookmark" so it didn't get totally lost in the funding picture. The crux of the problem is the available funds ($ of dollars) versus Route 2's small urban population base, regardless of its status as a major east-west U. S. highway and travel "river" to major tourist and recreation areas. In order to beef up the cost-population ratio, Koster urged constructing large, self-contained (1000-acre-plus) communities in rural enclaves such as Redmond Ridge, where all needs could be met within the "communal area." Or, alternatively, for Sultan, Gold Bar and other cities, that they need to grow bigger to help justify funding, thereby gaining financial clout. When Sultan resident John Dick suggested it might be better to develop and pay for the needed infrastructure first, Koster's response was in order to fund those improvements, his suggestion was to eliminate traffic and other impact fees and finance infrastructure funding by creating and imposing a real estate excise tax on new home construction.)

WSP Captain Lenz urged a strong, unified and coordinated effort by the Coalition and Route 2 corridor residents, directed not just to Governor Locke, state legislators and Congress, but also to applicable WSDOT personnel who can be influential "behind the scenes" to help get the message across. When asked about the availability of recent accident data on Route 2 (since the CRASH reporting system was eliminated several years ago), Lenz said he'd provide Chief Walser with that information to share with the community.

The comment was made that it's tough to "sell" tourism for a still-pristine Eastern Washington recreation area and skiing in Stevens Pass when folks can't get to it. (I've had more than one skier tell me that they opt for Snoqualmie Pass or other areas, because of the Route 2 mess, especially through Sultan.) EDC representative Carolyn Eslick communicated an effort by a group of business people in Monroe and points west who are trying to organize a community ski train to help alleviate Route 2 traffic by using rail to ferry skiers to the Pass (using shuttles from the rail terminal to the Stevens ski area).

Sam Richard from W&H Pacific (W&H is a board member of ECI; planners, surveyors and engineers) gave a recap of the status on Sultan Basin Road, saying the channelization and traffic control will be relocated east from its current position. They hope to have a preferred alternative selected by March 1^st. Jeff Kreschel from Berryman & Heniger said the delay on the 5^th Street signalization was due to funding, but looks as if that is now resolved (a $159,000 grant was received by the city).

To verbally mitigate the gridlock currently on Route 2, Mayor Rowe being caused by gravel truck traffic, he said that 35 years ago the logging trucks made a "steady stream" to/from Monroe on old Highway 2 (which was then Old Owen road), just as gravel trucks do today (or will be doing shortly). Therefore, nothing has changed. This sentiment was echoed by Chief Walser. Perhaps I misunderstood them both, but it seems to me that's like comparing apples to carrots: Those logging trucks, and the influx of people to support the industry, were primary reasons an improved road was needed. That comparison seems like saying Highway 99 from Lynwood to Seattle was gridlocked 30 years ago, too, so nothing much has changed, despite the presence of I-5. (One cannot escape the correlation between development and the -- expensive -- infrastructure to support it.)