Consultants Offer Changes For State’s Costly Highways

Washington’s highways cost more than the national average to build and to maintain, and reforms could save the state millions, consultants hired by the Legislature said Monday night.

The analysis - and the ideas for freeing dollars for badly needed highway projects - were welcomed by lawmakers from both parties and by the governor’s budget director.

The reason: All of this year’s proposals for highway funding rely in part on squeezing more productivity out of the state Department of Transportation.

Democratic Gov. Gary Locke’s proposal, which also includes an 11-cent gasoline tax increase over five years, presumes savings of about $5 million a year. Majority Republicans in the Legislature are pushing even more aggressively with a plan that presumes savings of over $200 million over the next 25 years.

Lawmakers got a preliminary look at a performance audit conducted by the national consulting firm of Cambridge Systematics. Although conceding that it’s tough to get a good “apples and apples” comparison with other states, the consultants said the state pays 80 percent more per mile than the average state with less than 10,000 miles of road.

Washington, which has about 7,000 miles of highway, paid an average of $109,000 a mile for new construction in 1995.

Maintenance costs were 7 percent higher than the national average - 18 percent higher when snow and ice removal are added.

Consultants said there are good explanations for the numbers and acknowledged the state’s diverse and sometimes difficult terrain. But they said lawmakers and the department could save millions of dollars by changing how they do business.

Key recommendations:

DOT could save $6 million every two years by dropping its avoidable construction change orders by half.

The state could save $6 million every biennium by allowing “managed competition” in awarded maintenance contracts to either DOT crews or the private sector, depending on which turns in the best bid. This would take a change in state law, since “contracting out” is largely forbidden.

Creating wetland banks and reducing environmental costs of highway projects, fine-tuning the state’s prevailing wage law, and streamlining regulatory and permit approval all could save money. Consultants couldn’t give an estimate. The audit said the state spends nearly 10 percent of the highway construction budget on environmental costs.

Consultants said the agency is well-run but still could stand some improvement.

State Budget Director Dick Thompson said in an interview that the new report shows significant potential savings, but added, “we’re talking about only double-digit millions, when the transportation need has been described in double-digit billions.”