Tacoma Sings on September 21st

16 comments

• J jamie from thriceallamerican February 6, 2008

  Political Buzz has updated their description of the tax implications. Apparently the .2% will come out of the states existing 6.5% sales tax collected in the Tacoma city limits, meaning no tax increase, just money shuffling at the state level.

• E Erik B. February 6, 2008

  Is this some sort of cruel joke?

  The whole reason Tacoma residents and the Tacoma City Council was outraged was because the state let the Murray Morgan fall into decay by not even painting it for decades.

  Where is councilmember Stenger when you need him?

  So the legislature is considering rebuilding Husky Stadium but is going to allow Tacoma to tax itself to rebuild a state route?

  Thanks alot for nothing. Something’s wrong here. That’s no help at all. There’s no extra money being offered by the state whatsoever.

  This bill would simply pass all of the responsibility of repairing the bridge to Tacoma in the most regressive taxing method possible that is not even related to car use.

  Here’s what should have been the headline today:

  *State of Washington Allocates 50 Million for the repair for Murray Morgan Bridge in Tacoma.*

  The state’s offer is like someone smashing your car but then offering to help you fill out a credit card application so you finance repairing it yourself.

• E Erik B. February 6, 2008

  Interesting change which makes a difference. Here is the post from the TNT:

  I had to correct an earlier post because I initially thought the City Council would be able to raise the sales tax to 9 percent from the current 8.8 percent in Tacoma. Then I ran into the city’s lobbyist, who explained the 0.2 percent sales tax for the bridge would come out of the state’s share of sales taxes collected inside the Tacoma city limits.

• G gritcitygirl February 6, 2008

  i’m all for saving the bridge but this is the state’s way of shoving responsibility off on the city. i hope our city council has a backbone in dealing with this issue.

• E Erik Hanberg February 6, 2008

  With this funding mechanism, wouldn’t the state be footing the bill for the bridge? If we owe them 6.5% sales tax, and they say that they’ll just count .2% of it toward a bridge, then they’re still paying for it a right? Not us.

  It will give Tacoma responsibility for the bridge, which means we’d have to pay for future repairs, etc, but it’s our bridge and we should be working to take charge of it anyway. Especially when they’re paying to fix it/rebuild it.

  I might be mis-reading this, but it seems like a good deal for Tacoma. Were I a city council person I’d be very tempted to take the offer.

• E Erik B. February 6, 2008

  With this funding mechanism, wouldn’t the state be footing the bill for the bridge? If we owe them 6.5% sales tax, and they say that they’ll just count .2% of it toward a bridge, then they’re still paying for it a right? Not us.

  Yes. The devil is in the details, however.

  Taking over responsibility for the bridge could be a huge liability which could bankrupt our city, especially if the .2 percent were cut off.

  This is a bridge that is supposed to be maintained by the state. The city cannot take a $75,000,000 hit if something breaks and the state cuts off the money supply.

  We will see.

• R rich February 6, 2008

  aside from the fire trucks, and a few people that used the bridge to go work at the port, and all the trucks that use it as a short cut to the port…..why spend so much money on this thing……it would be a wasteful use of tax payers dollars……why not spend the money on developing better access to the Foss…….now that’s an idea…..

• M morgan February 6, 2008

  Isn’t the Port planning on building a bunch of new commercial office/retail space on the eastern side of the Foss? One would think it would be in the Port’s best interest to provide ease of access to these projects – not to mention the Urban Waters project.

• E Erik B. February 6, 2008

  aside from the fire trucks, and a few people that used the bridge to go work at the port, and all the trucks that use it as a short cut to the port…..why spend so much money on this thing

  I think Tacoma is trying to service the Port and is spending something like a million to continue the coverage. Perhaps the Port needs to pick up this cost.

• H Highwater February 6, 2008

  “I might be mis-reading this, but it seems like a good deal for Tacoma. Were I a city council person I’d be very tempted to take the offer.”

  This is not a good deal, it’s a bad deal and a stupid idea. Like it or not, the current bridge is a rusting hulk that’s going to be very, very expensive to repair or to replace. Given Tacoma’s poor track record at maintaining simple asphalt roads, what makes anyone think the city will do any better on a structurally deficient, ancient steel bridge? Some old things outlive their usefulness, and sadly, the MM Bridge is one of them. Tacoma should start with simple, essential things, like potholes and the sinking mess that is Pacific Avenue. If the state is so willing to give us back 0.2% of the sales tax, we should use it for a road project that will actually benefit a large number of citizens.

• E Erik Hanberg February 7, 2008

  I understand that there’s an added responsibility for the City to taking the bridge on. But if it were our bridge we wouldn’t get into the legal squabbles with another bureaucracy about whether to save it or not. It would be our choice.

  If the state is willing to make up for letting it fall into such a state of disrepair by sinking tens of millions of dollars into it, that’s a victory for Tacoma.

  And once they’re done, it gets turned over to its rightful owners: the people of Tacoma. We can decide what to do with it from there.

• R Republican (By Default) February 7, 2008

  I think preserving history is important, but there are limits. One limit is the price tag. This one seems pretty high, but I think the results of the inspection will tell us more about that. And with the recycle value of steel where it is right now it could help offset the cost of demolition.

  I also don’t think that preserving history should keep us from a brighter future. There are a number of things that might be able to make use of that real estate.

  Tacoma needs to think about some other issues before it spends a boatload of money on yet another outdoor museum.

  And personally, I think it’s ugly, but that’s just my opinion.

• A Andrew February 7, 2008

  I agree wholeheartedly with RBD. If it costs more to repair the bridge than to tear it down and build a new (and hopefully, much more maintenance-efficient) bridge, let’s knock the sucker down.

  “Historical” is not a value statement, people.

• T TheGulag February 7, 2008

  “If it costs more to repair the bridge than to tear it down and build a new one…”

  Maybe someone could clarify the details, or correct me, but I remember reading somewhere (in 2004?) that the cost of demolition and the building of a new 11’th street bridge was significantly greater than that for complete refurbishment.

• R Randy Lewis February 7, 2008

  @15 You are correct. A new bridge is far more expensive than rehabilitating the existing bridge. A new bridge must also be a lift structure, which is very expensive, and you must also include the cost of removal of the existing bridge. Rehabing is about half the cost of a new structure. A rehabed bridge should have a life of 30 to 50 years.

• N NSHDscott February 7, 2008

  All this .2% talk is silly. Ultimately, if this goes through, the state is committing part of its tax revenues to pay for the repair, right? That’s all that really matters. I don’t need to see the math.

  What I do want to see are reassurances that this state funding will completely cover the cost of the rehab, and that if Tacoma will be taking over responsibility for it, that rehab better be done right. It can’t be a 10-year fix, it needs to be a 50-year fix, with Tacoma’s responsibility primarily being painting and lubricating.