Sta Plans To Help Out With Repairs Transit Agency Shifts Gears, Sets Aside $1.45 Million For Local Road Work In 1998

Spokane Transit Authority has set aside $1.45 million for road repair projects in 1998 - less than a year after fighting efforts to encourage just that.

It’s not clear how the money will be spent, only that projects must be along STA bus routes.

Spokane County and the cities of Spokane, Airway Heights, Medical Lake and Cheney can apply to use the money for projects ranging from upgrading traffic signals to repaving bus lanes.

“We’ve spent the last six months trying to figure out if there’s a way, under existing law, to use some of our money … for transit-related projects,” STA Executive Director Allen Schweim said Tuesday.

In recent years, lawmakers and some city officials have looked to STA in their search for money to fix Spokane’s crumbling streets.

They argued that STA buses contribute to the problem and point out that the agency has a multimillion-dollar reserve account.

But some STA board members have argued against paying for street repairs, claiming transit money should be used for the transit system.

Board members also claimed a 1988 state attorney general’s opinion forbids such a move and fought efforts by state Sen. Jim West, R-Spokane, to clarify the law last spring.

Now, STA board members have asked the state attorney general for a new legal opinion. And West said he expects their support when he reintroduces his bill allowing cities and counties to contract with STA for road work.

“Now they’re actually doing it, when last year they said the law wouldn’t allow it,” West said.

West’s bill was supported by some board members last year but was attacked by small-city mayors.

Some feared STA money would be spent primarily in Spokane. Others believed applying STA money to road work would set a harmful precedent.

“Transit as a whole needs to protect its funding,” lame duck Airway Heights Mayor Don Harmon said. “If we demonstrate we don’t need it for transit and don’t use it for transit, why should the federal government give it to us at all?”

Board members are split on whether the move signals a shift in the agency’s willingness to help with street work.

Spokane County Commissioner John Roskelley said he believes it does.

“I think they felt like there was so much public outcry on roads that STA needed to step forward and just help out,” Roskelley said.

But Harmon said STA often uses its resources on capital projects that are transit-related.

“Now it’s just more official,” he said.

Regardless, Schweim and Roskelley point out that $1.45 million will help - but not solve - the problem.

“STA isn’t a panacea,” Roskelley said. “It’s a little help.”

, DataTimes