Taken aback by the surprising (26–2) success of state Representative Mary Lou Dickerson's proposal to force Mayor Greg Nickels to come up with a funding plan for his $4 billion Alaskan Way tunnel by April 1, 2006, house transportation committee chair Ed Murray countered Thursday with a (much more Nickels-friendly) proposal of his own. The Murray plan would push Dickerson's deadline back to January 1, 2007, and would, unlike Dickerson's, allow Nickels to include both secured and "anticipated" funding sources in his proposal.

So far, secured funds amount to just $2.5 billion—$1.2 billion to $2 billion less than the total estimated cost of the mayor's tunnel. Deputy Mayor Tim Ceis has said that once both secured and anticipated funding sources are considered, the city can put together $3.2 billion. But those funds include hundreds of millions from the city's general fund, City Light, and unspecified "transportation revenues." All of that funding would have to be approved by the city council and the Port of Seattle—something neither body has guaranteed it will do. "Basically, he's assuming we'll say yes," says Council President Nick Licata, who supported Dickerson's more strongly worded bill. Port spokesman Mick Schultz says the $200 million in Port money included in Nickels's plan would have to be approved annually by the elected Port Commission, in $20 million chunks—approval that "is not guaranteed."

Murray counters that the state "does a lot of projects that rely on anticipated money," adding that his bill requires a "fiscal policy analysis" to determine whether Nickels's funding assumptions are feasible.

In the case of utility relocation funding, the mayor is counting on City Light and Seattle Public Utilities to contribute as much as $526 million to the project—a requirement that would, Dickerson predicts, "require major hikes in utility rates." (Committing ratepayer dollars to the tunnel, Licata adds, may put the city on shaky ground: Utility relocation costs for the tunnel would be an estimated $100 million higher than if the state simply rebuilt the viaduct in place, raising the question of whether the tunnel plan improperly uses ratepayer dollars for a non-utility-related purpose because it is more expensive than the rebuild.)

In a statement, Dickerson called Murray's amendment "the best we can do, given the opposition in the senate to the amendment which insisted on a decision by April 1." Dickerson was skeptical, however, about Nickels's ability to come up with the additional billions to build the entire tunnel. Delaying a decision until January, she added, "could mean we waste millions of taxpayer dollars by going forward with two designs"—the tunnel and a larger, rebuilt viaduct.

barnett@thestranger.com