How Sound Transit loses people — even in liberal cities like Tacoma | Opinion

Pierce County Executive Bruce Dammeier likened it to a car trying to get down an icy road.

Once things go “sideways,” the twice-elected Republican and member of Sound Transit’s board said, it’s hard to correct — and easy to find yourself in a ditch.

Dammeier was talking about Sound Transit’s Hilltop Tacoma Link Extension, although maybe you didn’t need me to tell you that. If we were trying to find ways to describe the 2.4 mile project — which will one day connect the Stadium District and Hilltop — “sideways” is only one of them.

You could go with the obvious choices, like: repeatedly delayed and over budget. Originally scheduled to open almost exactly a year ago, it will now be late summer, if we’re lucky, before the ribbon is cut on an undertaking that will cost an estimated $283 million, or $60 million more than anticipated. Of course, you could also take the more colorful route, underscoring just what a nightmare it’s been for neighborhoods and businesses that have watched their streets torn up and re-torn up since construction began in 2018.

But you know what else you could call it? An example of how Big Transit loses its footing in hardscrabble but historically liberal cities like Tacoma.

And if we go ahead and acknowledge the partisan politics of transit — which we should, since liberals tend to like it and conservatives don’t — it’s a masterclass in how Democrats squander hardworking people’s faith by making big promises they fail to deliver on while also appearing tone deaf to the hardships that bungled projects inflict.

The truth is, this project jumped the proverbial shark a long time ago, replacing any excitement I had with feelings of angst and resentment toward Sound Transit (and don’t even get me started on the latest Tacoma Link Extension delay). Keep in mind, this is coming from a guy who brings his own bags to the grocery store, used cloth diapers on his children and, most pertinent to this column, has championed the benefit of transit development across the region many times over the years.

So is it an I-told-you-so moment for Republicans? I mean, it’s impossible to say until the light rail extension is up and running and its impacts are fully known … but, yeah, kind of.

More important: It only adds to the narrative that government can’t do anything right — let alone an endeavor of the magnitude that Sound Transit is responsible for — which undermines any future effort to pull off big, transformative projects across the state.

Dammeier’s quote, harvested by Seattle Times reporter Mike Lindblom, came in response to the Hilltop Tacoma Link Extension’s latest headache — a dispute between a veteran-owned electric subcontractor and Sound Transit, the regional transit authority overseeing millions of dollars of work in Tacoma and billions across the region.

As the Times reported, the subcontractor, Liberty Electric, was hired to install 340 steel poles that are part of the project, designed to support the wires that will power the line’s electric streetcars. In an email sent to the Sound Transit board earlier this year, the company sought millions of dollars for lost time and extra work orders, claiming that Sound Transit bureaucracy and mismanagement were responsible for the cost overruns.

Jim Grohs, Liberty’s vice president, described it as the “most miserable” experience he’s had working with Sound Transit. Some of his grievances, the story notes, sound similar to the findings of a report by a technical advisory group aiding the project.

In February, the group delivered a report to Sound Transit’s board, which, as Lindblom reported, found that subcontractors reported inflating Sound Transit bids in anticipation of headaches and would generally prefer to work for someone else

In short, it sounds a lot like the scenario many conservatives foretold — an example of inefficiency and red tape and bloated budgets feasting on public funds.

For the sake of brevity, I’ll note that Sound Transit defended itself against Liberty’s complaints, describing the company’s planned pace of work as “flawed and over optimistic.” And because I’m not an expert in major construction projects, steel poles, underground utilities or complicated contracts, I won’t attempt to pick sides in the million-dollar squabble. If experience has taught us anything, it’s that the truth probably rests somewhere in the middle.

But here’s the thing: The polls aren’t the point.

This isn’t about a surprise utility line here or a regrade there. It’s not about one screw-up, or the validity of one excuse, or the outcome of one dispute.

It’s not about all the varying factors — from the pandemic to supply chain disruptions and the toll of inflation — that have made Sound Transit’s job incredibly difficult over the last five years, and the original construction timeline impossible. It’s also not about the transit agency’s unique regional structure, and everything that makes it unwieldy and cumbersome.

It’s about the full picture. It’s about what was promised, and what’s been delivered.

It’s about the dull, nagging feeling that now that Sound Transit has our money, the agency really doesn’t care — regardless of whether that’s true or not.

It’s about what happens next time Democrats propose a generational project of this scope.

Even in a place like Tacoma — and even among voters inclined to support big ideas in the past — you have to repay people’s trust if you want to keep it.