While last year's monorail vote passed citywide with just over 50 percent, it won big in the district that State Rep. Ed Murray represents--at 60 percent and even 80 percent in some precincts on Capitol Hill. Many of the monorail diehards who live in the heart of Murray's district are unhappy with Murray--and they're letting him know.
"Ed Murray's loyalty is to the Sims/Pelz insider anti-monorail cabal, instead of to voters in his district--voters who overwhelmingly supported the monorail," says Capitol Hill monorail crusader Grant Cogswell. "There are lots of people we could send to Olympia to vote for gay rights and education in his place."
Then there's this February 27 e-mail to Murray from a Capitol Hill resident on 19th Avenue East. "SUBJECT: Please Leave the Monorail Alone. You're just proving the point to all of us who live in Seattle and keep voting for the monorail: that people in government are threatened by outside public projects that they have no control over. Generally I have been very happy with your representation. But this is as big of a red herring as they get."
Monorail fans are on edge about a bill Murray is pushing in Olympia. Ironically, for starters the bill does two things that the monorail agency, the Seattle Popular Monorail Authority (SPMA), has been clamoring for: fixing a loophole in state law that allows Seattle residents to register cars outside city limits (thus avoiding the monorail tax), and adding a legislative provision that would strengthen the SPMA's bond rating by guaranteeing that bondholders get paid back even if the SPMA gets deep-sixed by voters ["Wall Street Whacks Monorail," Josh Feit, Feb 6].
However, there are two other things in Murray's proposed legislation. Murray's HB 1962 would change the SPMA's board structure and make it easier for voters to dissolve the SPMA.
Murray believes the current board is too crowded with SPMA appointments, and thus, "true believers" who won't cast a critical eye on the project. So, Murray wants to change the current setup--five SPMA appointees, two city council appointees, two mayoral appointees, and a commitment to look at putting elected members on board in 2005--to seven mayoral appointees and two elected. Monorail board chair Tom Weeks thinks Murray's "rubber-stamp" characterization of the current board is off base, pointing out that four of the nine members--including board appointment and construction guy Richard Stevenson--were not monorail supporters during last year's campaign.
The SPMA's real concern with Murray's proposed board change, though, is that doing so may send the project back to the voters because it would be a "material change" from the approved plan. Murray told The Stranger "absolutely" he's not interested in having the plan go back to the voters, and he's willing to compromise with the SPMA to make sure that doesn't happen. "I think we should build transportation projects not send them back to the ballot," he says, "but we should be sure we have the right people watching the shop."
The other proposed change that has monorail supporters upset involves the process of initiating a ballot measure to dissolve the SPMA--lowering the number of required signatures from 15 percent of voters in the last mayoral election to 10 percent. Murray also wants to double the time petitioners have to gather those signatures from 90 to 180 days. Murray says those are "simply the criteria for sending any measure to the ballot in Seattle." He's right. However, referring to the fact that voters passed the monorail three times now, monorail advocate Peter Sherwin quips, "And maybe they should have to vote down the monorail three times before dissolving the agency."
Meanwhile, Murray and the SPMA are currently working out a compromise to define the term "financial mismanagement"--the grounds for citizens to initiate the repeal petition.
"If he's going to make it easier to dissolve," says SPMA board chair Tom Weeks, "we'd like to clarify the trigger mechanism."
Murray says, "I don't want someone to stop the project just to stop it, but if costs balloon, I want a check."
Ultimately, both of Murray's "checks" tied to his larger concern that the SPMA was trying to sell too many bonds before it knows the true costs of the project. "I feel like they want to lock in the project no matter what the true costs," says Murray. "It's a risky strategy and frankly my confidence level is not there for this project. I'm looking for safeguards."
Murray would like to see the bonding plan tied to costs as they become known and to an environmental impact statement--which, he says, will undoubtedly raise cost estimates. He's planning to float that idea by the SPMA this week.
The SPMA counters that interest rates are at such a historic low that selling bonds now would save taxpayers between $100 and $400 million on bond costs. Weeks says the SPMA would like to go ahead with about half the $1.5 billion bonding capacity. "It would be irresponsible not to sell the bonds now," Weeks says.
While Murray acknowledges that he's "not a monorail supporter currently," he says he's not the bad guy that monorail advocates claim he is. He points out that he's the one who pushed the enabling monorail legislation last session. He also rightly notes that the SPMA's requested fixes are in his bill too. Finally, Murray makes it clear that he's not part of any pro-Sound Transit/anti-monorail "cabal." For example, Murray is currently pissing off Sound Transit by floating a bill to make the entire Sound Transit board an elected body.
As for his monorail-happy Capitol Hill constituents, Murray is unrepentant. "I may disagree with my district, and they can vote me out. I'm not elected to be a robot. I'm elected to think and ask tough questions."
For example, Murray queries: "How much more are you willing to pay if the monorail price tag goes up?"
Meanwhile, there's an even larger question: Will Murray's bill, with its pro and con monorail aspects, even pass? It's up for more debate this week.
