Apr. 30—Walla Walla Valley officials say the U.S. 12 corridor project earned what was needed — and more for the road — in the state’s most recent transportation budget.
The transportation project budget for the 2023-25 biennium included $183.2 million for the Walla Walla corridor, where efforts to widen U.S. 12 between Burbank and Walla Walla have been ongoing since 2003.
Included in that sum was funding for the completion of the new roadway between Nine Mile Hill and the area of Frenchtown. Phase 7 has been under construction since about 2020 and is expected to open to traffic in summer 2023, according to the WSDOT project page.
The budget also included $21.8 million for the design and right-of-way for Phase 8, which covers the final 10-mile stretch from Attalia to Nine Mile Hill.
These funds were earmarked in 2015 as part of the $16 billion Connecting Washington funding package but hadn’t been included in project budgets since.
Securing that funding for 2023-25 was a primary goal for the U.S. Highway 12 Coalition and local government coalition, Walla Walla City Manager Elizabeth Chamberlain said.
“The need was to make sure we got that funding in this biennial budget, in this biennium, for Phase 8,” she said. “The money was committed. (The question was) when does it get allocated and spent? We were advocating that it needed to be allocated and spent in this budget that they just passed.”
The funds will be used for design, right-of-way acquisition and environmental impact assessments for Phase 8.
The budget also included a commitment by the state to provide a local match, which is generally required as part of federal grant applications.
Port of Walla Walla Executive Director Pat Reay said the state dollars will be used to leverage federal funds for the Walla Walla corridor.
“That’s significant because, to be competitive, the further along a project is, you’re more apt to receive an award and compete at the national level,” he said.
Reay said the coalition has been communicating with federal lawmakers about the project.
At the Port of Walla Walla Commissioners meeting on Thursday, April 27, Reay said U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers and U.S. Sen. Patty Murray both included the U.S. 12 Clinton interchange project, which is also in the Walla Walla corridor, in their lists for potential congressional direct spending.
“There’s just a lot intertwined,” Reay said in an interview. “You can see the length of time it takes in the process to accomplish something of that scale, size and cost.”
Budgeting process
State support for the project was a last-minute addition, according to Port of Walla Walla governmental affairs and community outreach specialist Meagan Blair.
Lobbyists for a coalition of local government agencies worked throughout the 2023 session to secure funds for U.S. 12, and Walla Walla Rep. Mark Klicker said at a town hall on March 28 that the outlook for securing the funds was promising.
But it still came down to the final conference, Blair said.
Conference committees of lawmakers from the House and Senate gave recommendations on April 21 and the budget was passed with recommendations from the conference on April 22. The session ended April 23.
“We were told that we were the last thing put into the budget, into the transportation (budget), but that they had never seen a better orchestrated and organized lobbying effort on the local, state and federal level to get a project done,” Blair told commissioners at the Port meeting.
Reay said support for the project was wide-ranging.
“It’s a transportation corridor,” he said. “The location is in our county, but the benefit is state and interstate.”
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