The Money Dried Up, And So Did The Grass

Forced by the Legislature to slash its landscaping budget, the state Department of Transportation is making even the worst home gardeners look good.

The lawns that line urban stretches of Interstate 90 and dot some cloverleafs have turned yellow because they’re no longer watered or fertilized. Because they’re not watered, they rarely must be mowed.

The few dandelions that can survive without irrigation are allowed to do so. Maintenance crews spray and pull only noxious weeds - those that spread quickly and push out native plants.

“We’re irrigating the established plants and trees because those would be the most expensive to replace,” said Dale Luiten, assistant maintenance superintendent for Spokane. “The lawns are pretty easy to bring back. They go dormant when you stop watering them.”

There’s no guarantee the transportation department ever will have the money to bring those lawns out of dormancy.

Told by voters to reduce spending, the Legislature cut about $260 million from the state transportation budget, and made it clear that more money should go toward roads and less for frills.

The budget for roadside maintenance for the two years starting July 1 is $17 million, said Larry Rus, who manages highway maintenance statewide. That’s down from $24 million for the two years that just ended.

Since litter still must be picked up, the biggest cut came from the budget for maintaining plants.

In northeastern Washington, the department cut its budget for maintaining plants from $180,000 last year to about $95,000 this year, said Paul Nelson, maintenance engineer for the eastern region. He hopes to save $40,000 in water alone.

The vast majority of the region’s maintenance money is spent on 54 acres of turf and plants in and around Spokane. Dry lawns now line I-90 from the West Plains to the Valley.

Lawns also are going dry along interstate highways in the Puget Sound region, and near Yakima and Vancouver, said Rus.

“Of course, we get a little more moisture (in Western Washington), so things probably aren’t as bad here as they are there,” he said.

Rural rest stops are in better shape than the lawns in urban corridors.

“We’re not letting the lawns go dormant there because we’re not buying the water from the city of Spokane,” said Luiten. “We take it out of our own wells, which is a lot less expensive.”

Luiten said some people have complained about the dry lawns near garden-happy Spokane.

“We’ve been getting a lot of calls on it,” he said. “All we can say is…we have to cut back on some of the services we provide.”

Highway landscaping began in the mid-1960s under the Highway Beautification Act, championed by Lady Bird Johnson, the former first lady. Native plants, which require little care, often weren’t available, or were rejected by landscape designers.

“We had a lot of federal money for design and construction of landscape areas,” said Rus. “There wasn’t much concern about making it low-maintenance and natural.

“I’m sure that will change in the future.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo