The much-discussed $79 million for flood mitigation projects in Lewis County didn’t make the cut during budget negotiations this biennium, but lawmakers say there are opportunities to recoup a portion of it the next time around.
The $79 million was brought up as part of transportation package negotiations in the Senate last March. The money was meant for projects in the county as defined by the Chehalis River Basin Work Group.
Sen. John Braun, R-Centralia, cited that money was a reason he voted for an 11.7-cent (now 11.9-cent) increase in the gas tax.
However, it wasn’t included in the agreed-to transportation package released late Monday afternoon. Braun only briefly responded to requests for comment about the money through text messages. He confirmed it wasn’t in the budget, but said, “there’s always hope.”
According to Rep. Ed Orcutt, R-Kalama, the Senate stipulated the flood money to fix flooding issues in Lewis County, unless it couldn’t, in which case it’d be used for projects between Interstate 5 exits 76 and 81. He said that prospect caused other lawmakers to worry about opening up a Pandora’s box of misdirection.
“I think they were concerned that if you start doing something that wasn’t a transportation project with those funds (you’d be) opening that door up too much,” he said.
Orcutt pointed to the Chamber Way/Interstate 5 interchange improvement project in Chehalis — which is included in the package to receive $75 million between 2019 and 2025 — as a place where local lawmakers could potentially squeeze out some flood funding in upcoming bienniums.
“This doesn’t mean any opportunity to get money for flooding is dead,” he said. “Maybe $35 or $40 million of that is for Chamber Way and the rest is for I-5. We could potentially get a portion of that for flooding. We’re going to have to do some work to get it.”
Aside from Chamber Way, the package includes $4.53 million to build a Mellen Street gateway connector to prevent future traffic congestion around the Mellen Street, Alder Street and the I-5 connector lanes in Centralia.
Documents from the city of Centralia suggest that designers of the current collector distributor lane that parallels the Interstate didn’t consider future commercial development in the area, and forecasted only a minor bump in traffic on Alder street where it intersects with the collector distributor. Without a larger buildout, future development in the area will lead to traffic jams and potentially unsafe driving conditions, the documents say.
The project was allocated $2 million in the 2015-17 biennium and $2.53 million in the 2017-19 biennium. The documents say just over $700,000 of local money would be required.
The money would add an alternative roadway from the I-5 and Mellen Interchange to the intersection of Mellen and Alder. A roundabout will be built where the roads intersect. Another roundabout or a stoplight will be built where the new road intersects with Alder. Alder itself will also be widened and reconstructed from the I-5 collector distributor down to Mellen. Additionally, the project will be completed with new streetlights, curbs and sidewalks for the length of the project.
The document also says this route will reduce the number of right turns taken at the intersection of the northbound collector distributor lanes and Mellen Street and shift those movements to the proposed roundabout to the east at the intersection of Mellen Street/Mellen Street gateway connector.
