Mr. Ulman points to two decades of neglect, but fails to point out that a key Democratic constituency, environmentalists, have gone to great lengths to obstruct anything that has to do with building new roads. He also fails to mention the Democrats long held view of mass transit as the only solution, and their desire to implement it over building new roads.

The Republicans on the other hand are holding up progress because they believe the citizens don’t have confidence in the WSDOT to spend our money wisely, and want to put it all in the hands of the private sector, want to speed up the permitting process and do away with the prevailing wage provision.

The joke, “What’s orange and sleeps four?” — with the answer being a WSDOT truck aside, WSDOT needs to be completely reorganized. However we don’t have the luxury of the time needed to do so.

Speeding up the permitting time will save money — lots of it. However the environmental safeguards built into the process can’t be ignored, but they can be speeded up.

Will the private sector save us money doing this work? Probably. But that’s not guaranteed. Every time United Infrastructure, a division of the giant Bechtel Corporation, opens its mouth about the Narrows Bridge project, the price goes up. However, the Republicans are dead on about not being able to get rid of WSDOT employees after the work is done, and that alone is a compelling reason to use the private sector.

The prevailing wage issue has some validity, but isn’t a reason to hold up progress. According to the Davis-Bacon Act which is the law governing this, prevailing wage isn’t always the big-city union wage. It’s the “prevailing wage for the area.” In many cases, especially in the South, union wages aren’t even considered in this calculation. This could easily apply to both Eastern Washington as well as the some areas of the western part of the state away from Seattle — if the Democrats will stand up to the unions for a change.

How do we pay for it? The Democrats have the right idea about tapping the feds for all they’re worth. Do we need more taxes? Unfortunately, we’re going to have to dig into our pockets — like it or not. However, the taxation should be proportionate to the work done in specific geographic areas. People in Ritzville or Long Beach shouldn’t be taxed to pay for improvements in Seattle.

It’s only the irresponsibility of the legislature — on both sides of the asile — that is causing us to have to face new taxes for this. If our legislature had listened to the voters on I-695, cut the 2 percent from the budget and tapped the reserve generated by I-601, we’d have a big chunk of the money needed without new taxes. Instead, they looted the reserve fund, increasing the budget by $900 million annually instead.

And now, to solve the problem, we will all have to pay for their political gamesmanship.