King County’s water taxi system is running on the last of its financial reserves and is awaiting the approval of a budget that could bring in the funds necessary to preserve service.
County officials are in the midst of planning next year’s budget. King County Executive Dow Constantine is reviewing budget proposals and is expected to present his budget to the county council at the end of September. The council will review and revise the budget if necessary and adopt a final budget for the county by late November.
According to King County Marine Division Director Paul Brodeur, in the proposal currently under review by Constantine, the marine division has asked for the water taxi’s levy — listed as the ferry district levy, but overseen by the division which has nothing to do with the state ferry system — to be raised to “a 10-year sustainable rate” in order to maintain the current two-route water taxi service. The exact rate has yet to be determined,
“It’s up to the executive to decide what that sustainable rate is,” Brodeur said.
One thing is certain: The current levy rate is too low to sustain current operations. The ferry district levy currently collects one-third of 1 cent per $1,000 of assessed home value, and has been since 2009. Brodeur said the current levy has been bringing in $1.2 million per year, but the taxi’s operating budget is $7.2 million.
But it wasn’t always that way. When the water taxi system began in 2008, the annual levy collected 5.5 cents of every $1,000 of assessed home value.
“We believed that was more than enough,” Brodeur said. “We built up capital and planned for new vessels, but then the recession hit.”
The county was faced with the possibility of having to drastically cut its Rapid Ride bus service, and since the ferry district’s levy was so high and Rapid Ride’s levy was not at its limit, the county adjusted levy rates: Rapid Ride’s rate went up, and the ferry district’s went down in equal proportions so that the total property tax amount was not affected.
The ferry district had built up a healthy reserve from its year and a half of collecting 5.5 cents, but after the major reduction in 2009, the levy was never re-adjusted. Now the system is left with empty reserves.
The Marine Division’s request for an increased levy and, therefore, continuation of water taxi service, must be approved by both Constantine and the council. Reached recently, representatives from both Constantine’s office and the council said they plan to preserve water taxi service.
Dwight Dively, Constantine’s director for performance, strategy and budget said that the executive is “committed to continuing the county’s water taxi service to both Vashon Island and West Seattle” before stating that the executive’s proposed 2017-2018 “will reflect continuing current operations.”
However, he noted that once Constantine proposes the new levy rate, approving it lies with the King County Council.
Reached earlier this month, King County Council Chair Joe McDermott, who uses the West Seattle water taxi to commute and represents the only district in the county that uses the water taxis, said he is confident the council will adopt a budget that sustains the current water taxi routes between West Seattle, Vashon and downtown Seattle. Citing traffic and the unreliability of car travel to arrive places on-time, he said the county would be “foolish” to lose the water taxis.
“We’ve invested a lot in this transit alternative,” he said. “This is the time to be expanding transit options, not reducing them. It’s a reliable way to get downtown; the West Seattle Bridge is not.”
The funding crunch comes at a time of burgeoning water taxi ridership and the addition of two new boats to the fleet. According to the county’s water taxi blog, ridership on the Vashon water taxi in 2015 was between 14,100 and 18,800 people every month for a total of 201,860 passengers for the year. Vashon ridership, when compared to the same month in the previous year, has risen for 17 consecutive months, and the water taxi set a ridership record on July 26 when it carried 241 passengers on the 5:30 p.m. sailing to Vashon. The boat’s capacity is 278 passengers.
The passengers are being carried by two boats that are both less than two years old. The M.V. Sally Fox was put into service on the Vashon route in April 2015 and the M.V. Doc Maynard went into service in West Seattle in December 2015. The boats were built despite the water taxis’ funding woes due to federal grants. While the levy pays for day-to-day operations, Brodeur said that over the years, the division has received around $40 million from the federal government that has gone toward capital projects — terminals, boats, etc. Recently, $13 million of federal funds went toward the construction of the Sally Fox and Doc Maynard — both were 80 percent funded by the grant.
Brodeur said the grants are thanks to the taxis’ “unique operation” and the fact that they are not considered part of the state highway system like the ferries are. Washington State Ferries (WSF) has also been experiencing a funding shortage and is in need of new boats, but Brodeur said the system can’t use federal grants for the construction of new ferries because of a stipulation in Washington state law.
“They (Washington State Ferries) compete in a whole different forum,” he said. “They can’t get federal money to build vessels because Washington state law says that the ferries have to be built in-state and if you receive federal money, the construction needs to be opened up to a national bidding process.”
While WSF continues to deal with decades-old vessels and dwindling funding, Brodeur said the water taxi and passenger-only water transportation like it is crucial not just for commuters, but for their flexibility and potential for use in emergency situations. He said that the recent Cascadia Rising emergency drill brought the taxis in as part of the emergency response.
“Car ferries have their place, but they’re limited by their size,” he said. “We’re definitely earthquake prone. We can get into places, like Vashon, that could be cut off by an earthquake and maneuver our boats in to evacuate people and even beach the boats if necessary.”
The division also recently submitted a report to the council looking into the potential to expand water taxi service with two routes on Lake Washington — between the University of Washington, Kenmore and Kirkland — and add a route in the sound from Ballard to downtown. According to a February article on the Seattle Transit Blog, the expansions, if approved, would require the ferry district levy to be raised from the predicted $9.55 per year for a $500,000 home that is necessary to maintain current service, to an expected nearly $22 per year for a $500,000 house. Those levy estimates are the last known amounts to be made public and the blog article’s author said the numbers have likely changed. Brodeur said he could not comment on the exact levy amount being requested.
The conversation about whether to expand will be happening this fall during the budget process.
“I think, right now, our focus is making sure we can sustain existing service,” McDermott said.
