The Wash­ing­ton State Sen­ate Demo­c­ra­t­ic cau­cus has cho­sen a new leader for the cham­ber’s influ­en­tial and pow­er­ful Trans­porta­tion Com­mit­tee: Marko Liias (D‑21st Dis­trict; Sno­homish Coun­ty). Liias will take over from his col­league Steve Hobbs, who resigned from the Sen­ate last month to become Sec­re­tary of State.

“It is an hon­or that my col­leagues trust me with this respon­si­bil­i­ty and have select­ed me for this posi­tion,” said Liias in a state­ment. “As we face dra­mat­ic changes to trans­porta­tion rev­enue and mobil­i­ty options, this is our moment to write a vision­ary, equi­table, cli­mate-focused trans­porta­tion pack­age that invests in our shared pri­or­i­ties while respect­ing our real and unique local needs.”

The oth­er final­ist for the posi­tion, NPI under­stands, was Rebec­ca Sal­daña (D‑37th Dis­trict; Seat­tle) who is cur­rent­ly the Vice Chair of Transportation.

Both Liias and Sal­daña are part of the cau­cus’ lead­er­ship team: Sal­daña is a Deputy Major­i­ty Leader and Liias is the Major­i­ty Floor Leader.

The cau­cus select­ed from between Liias and Sal­daña in an inter­nal vote. The cau­cus’ stan­dard oper­at­ing pro­ce­dure for lead­er­ship and com­mit­tee chair elec­tions is to use a secret bal­lot to reduce fric­tion and pos­si­ble acrimony.

The Sen­ate Demo­c­ra­t­ic cau­cus not­ed that Liias has been involved in trans­porta­tion advo­ca­cy and leg­is­lat­ing for over a decade.

“Liias had served as Vice Chair of the House Trans­porta­tion Com­mit­tee from 2008 until his appoint­ment to the Sen­ate in 2014 and helped nego­ti­ate the Legislature’s last trans­porta­tion rev­enue pack­age in 2015. In the Sen­ate, he has played key roles on numer­ous trans­porta­tion issues, includ­ing and espe­cial­ly tran­sit access,” the cau­cus’ state­ment point­ed out, cit­ing Liias’ pre­vi­ous ser­vice in the House.

Hobbs had been Trans­porta­tion Chair since Democ­rats regained a Sen­ate major­i­ty in late 2017 with Sen­a­tor Man­ka Dhin­gra’s spe­cial elec­tion victory.

At the time of his appoint­ment to the exec­u­tive depart­ment, Hobbs was work­ing on nego­ti­at­ing a new statewide trans­porta­tion pack­age with Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee’s office and House lead­er­ship. Hobbs’ oppo­si­tion to cli­mate action bills and high­way-cen­tric trans­porta­tion advo­ca­cy have long frus­trat­ed Wash­ing­to­ni­ans work­ing on the caus­es of reduc­ing pol­lu­tion and improv­ing free­dom of mobility.

With Hobbs now in the exec­u­tive depart­ment, Sen­ate Trans­porta­tion will be run by Liias, who is promis­ing a dif­fer­ent approach, as the state­ment above demon­strates. It’s nice to see the words “equi­table” and “cli­mate-focused” in the same sen­tence as “trans­porta­tion pack­age that invests in our shared priorities.”

Sen­a­tor Marko Liias at Mariner Library for the pub­lic launch of the Mariner Com­mu­ni­ty Cam­pus project (Pho­to: Sno-Isle Libraries, repro­duced under a Cre­ative Com­mons license)

To meet the moment, the Leg­is­la­ture will need to pass a trans­porta­tion pack­age that is rad­i­cal­ly dif­fer­ent from the car-cen­tric pack­ages it has adopt­ed in the past. Instead of appro­pri­at­ing huge sums for widen­ing high­ways or build­ing new high­ways, the Leg­is­la­ture must make mean­ing­ful invest­ments in bus and rail tran­sit, fer­ries, bike paths, side­walks, and mul­ti­modal infrastructure.

It would be a mis­take to con­tin­ue pour­ing huge sums into adding more lanes to already wide high­ways like Inter­state 5, even if the new lanes are to be ded­i­cat­ed to high occu­pan­cy vehi­cles. Our high­ways are wide enough.

We’re hope­ful that Sen­a­tor Liias will push for a trans­porta­tion pack­age that makes big invest­ments in Amtrak Cas­cades, freight mobil­i­ty, fish pas­sage, and right of way for pedes­tri­ans and bicy­clists. The state should also help Sound Tran­sit deliv­er ST3 faster and pro­vide fund­ing to rur­al tran­sit agen­cies to ensure we can offer bet­ter, high­er fre­quen­cy bus ser­vice. We do need to replace the I‑5 Colum­bia Riv­er Bridge and the U.S. 2 tres­tle up in Sno­homish Coun­ty, but we should not be using those projects to increase car capac­i­ty, which would inflate their price tag.