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Sumner holds public hearing on forming transportation benefit district to fund road maintenance
Summary
Sumner City held a public hearing on forming a Transportation Benefit District (TBD) that could use a 0.1% sales tax to raise an estimated $800,000–$850,000 a year to fund road maintenance, with residents urging the city to prioritize chip-seal preservation and others opposing a new tax.
Communications Director Carmen Palmer told the Sumner City Council during a public hearing that the city is considering forming a Transportation Benefit District that would match the city limits of Sumner and could, if funded with a 0.1% sales tax, generate about $800,000 to $850,000 per year for transportation construction and maintenance.
Palmer said, “Although this is not about funding, the end goal is to use the point 1% sales tax option, available to generate about 800,000 to 850,000 per year for transportation, construction, and maintenance.” She outlined a three-step state-mandated process: form the district, consider assuming leadership rather than creating a separate board, and then adopt an ordinance to set funding; the sales-tax decision would come at the final step.
The presentation stressed maintenance needs: Palmer said about 10% of the city’s roads were in “fair or poor” condition and that routine preservation extends pavement life. She provided planning figures presented to the council: chip-sealing the worst 10% would cost roughly $9,000,000; a full overlay of the same segments about $16,000,000; a crack-seal plus chip-seal program to meet a 15-year preservation cycle about $13,000,000. By comparison, the current annual budget for road maintenance is $400,000; a 15-year revenue projection for a TBD at 0.1% was given as about $12,700,000.
Two residents who signed up to speak voiced different priorities. Randall Adams of Sumner urged the council to devote TBD revenue first to chip-seal and preservation and not to use the funds primarily for reconstruction. Adams said, “Every dollar of this revenue should go into your chip seal and ceilings to long term reduce the cost of maintaining roads.” He recommended using current city reserves (including proceeds from past golf-course sales, he said) for reconstruction projects rather than drawing down the maintenance fund.
Mike Herbert, also of Sumner, argued against creating a new local tax now. He said the city should “live within their budget just like every household and individual” and recommended waiting to see how recently expanded state sales-tax rules on services and an expected new car dealership will affect local revenue before adding a city TBD tax.
No council vote on forming the TBD occurred at the hearing. City staff notified the council that the topic will return to the agenda: City Administrator Jason Wilson listed at the end of the meeting that the ordinance for forming the Transportation Benefit District will be on the July 21 regular council meeting agenda, and the council will later consider the ordinance to fund any district.
The council opened the public hearing at 6:04 p.m. and closed it at 6:16 p.m.
