Sound Transit weighs new ballot issue

Sound Transit officials are considering putting another transit-expansion measure on the ballot in the urban areas of King, Pierce and Snohomish counties.

The major question is when.

Voters rejected a $47 billion measure in November that would have expanded light rail service to Redmond, Tacoma and Mill Creek and would have built 186 miles of new highway lanes and ramps.

Sound Transit staff members said Thursday that they hoped the board will decide by March whether to put another proposal to a vote in 2008.

Sound board members, who are locally elected officials from the three counties, said a new package would have to be smaller to get voter approval. But what gets cut and whether there's time to substitute new projects remain undecided.

Given time constraints and looming issues such as replacing the Alaskan Way Viaduct, board members interviewed Thursday said they were uncertain whether a new package could be on the ballot this year.

"If you want to spend other people's money, you've got to do it right," said King County Executive Ron Sims, a Sound Transit board member.

Sound Transit has sent a new version of once-rejected measures to the ballot before; its first transit-tax measure was defeated in 1995, then passed the following year after it was pared down.

But Sims said November would be too early to put another transit measure to voters, because decisions won't have been made by then about replacing the central segment of the viaduct and about managing north-south traffic through Seattle.

State legislators may have decided to impose tolls on a new Evergreen Point Bridge, but responses to tolls could affect transit service -- another factor Sound Transit may consider, Sims said.

"You don't go to the ballot unless (the measure) is integrated," he said.

The two other county executives on the Sound Transit board, Pierce County's John Ladenburg and Snohomish County's Aaron Reardon, said that since the November vote, residents in the two counties have discussed different, less costly projects that could be part of a new proposal.

Those include extending light rail to Puyallup, rather than Tacoma, new park and ride facilities and more frequent bus service on state Route 99 in Snohomish County.

Some expansion of Sounder rail service could be added to a new package, but new light rail or other proposals would require environmental analysis, which could take months.

Also looming, Ladenburg said, is a proposal in the Legislature to expand Sound Transit's duties to include highways.

But 2010 is a possibility, said Sound Transit's chief executive, Joni Earl, after the agency opens the first segment of its light rail system.

The agency plans to survey voters in the three counties via its Web site about another measure, and board members have scheduled a workshop from 2 to 4 p.m. Jan. 31 at Sound Transit headquarters to discuss related issues, including population and traffic forecasts.

The November 2007 measure was rejected by voters, 56 percent to 44 percent. Polling done shortly afterward showed that voters thought the package was too big and expensive, even though they weren't clear about how much it would cost.