I have been reading a fascinating document, titled “Washington State County Road Administration Board 2009 Annual Report.”  This is the agency tasked with oversight of County Road Departments across the state.  They provide training, technical assistance, financial guidance, and monitor compliance.

I like reading these 3rd-party reviews of County government because it gives perspective on how we are performing as a County – compared to expectations and compared to other counties.  It also provides the “big picture” numbers that can tell the simplest and most informative story.  In Whatcom County, we spend:

$36,000 per mile

$500 property taxes per household

 So that you have an idea how I calculated these rough numbers, here are some basic data (as of 1/1/2009) and assumptions, and if I have made an error PLEASE let me know:

•  Miles of County roads controlled/paid by Whatcom County: 950

• County Road Budget: $34 million
  • Construction: $14 million (!)
  • Maintenance: $12 million
  • Admin, Ops, etc: $8 million

• Major contributors to that budget:
  • County property tax: $16 million
  • Federal grants: $11 million
  • Motor Vehicle Fuel Tax: $4 million

• Unincorporated County population who pay that property tax: roughly 100,000 men, women, children; or 32,000 households

These numbers place us in the middle of the pack compared to other counties.  Some do a better job of leveraging Federal dollars, others worse.  I would like to know more about the percentage of spending that is labeled as “Construction.”  Where are those projects?  How much of that is pass-through Federal and State dollars?  Could we cut back on “new” construction of roads and save ourselves some money?  Or does construction include repairs that are so desperately needed that it qualifies for the description?

I do not have the answers but I am asking questions… what do you all think?

This entry was posted on Monday, March 8th, 2010 at 5:20 pm and is filed under Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.