Sound Transit Needs New CEO and Board.

The videos of the December 17th Sound Transit Finance and Audit committee and subsequent board meeting are the clearest evidence yet Sound Transit needs a new CEO and board.  They prompted me to announce my candidacy for King County Executive in 2021.  As with my previous nine candidacies with no expectation or desire to win.  It's an attempt to make up for the Seattle Times decade-long failure to inform the county about Sound Transit's inability to deal with the area's congestion.

The videos showing the Sound Transit Board response to the October 10th "Financial Plan update & Proposed 2021" exemplified that failure.  That neither Sound Transit CEO Peter Rogoff nor Dow Constantine's Board of Directors understood a light rail spine routed through DSTT wouldn't reduce congestion.  That the way to reduce congestion on existing roadways was to increase access to transit with increased capacity along roadway into Seattle.

The December 17th videos recorded Sound Transit CEO Rogoff and board failure to do either.  The presentation included the "Long Range Financial Plan Projections 2017-2041" and "Proposed 2021 Budget" charts as the October 10th budget.  However the presentation also included a "Transit Improvement Plan to 2026" chart that wasn't in the October 10th budget.  It showed $21.46 billion in "Board-approved costs for active projects through 2026".

The presentation included 4 charts with budget numbers and took about 10 minutes. No one asked any questions and all 17 board members approved the budget in less than 10 minutes. (All of the board members ignored an email of my objections that was distributed prior to meeting.) Afterwords CEO Rogoff congratulated the board and the staffs for this year's approach to the budget.  

A competent board would've never approved a ten-minute presentation of a budget.  A competent CEO would have included the boards approval of spending $21.46 billion between 2021 and 2026 in the October 10th "Financial Plan update and Proposed 2021 Budget".  Especially since the October 10th budget response to COVID-19 was a 4-year realignment with no increase in "Outstanding debt" until 2029.  Yet even the $2.5 billion expansions in 2021 budget required a $700 million TIFIA loan.

Still no one on the board objected to the plan to spend the $21.46 billion or to the fact it wasn't even included in the October 10th budget.  The end result being the only ones aware of the plan are those who watched the video.

  

Those failures pale in comparison to the fact that even if they find the funds, extending light rail through the DSTT increases operating costs, not capacity.  What riders the extensions add will limit access to current Central Link riders.  Northgate Link operation next September will demonstrate CEO Rogoff and board claims for 41,000 to 49,000 are delusional.  That the end result of the $21.46 billion TIP will be a huge bond debt, a light rail spine too costly to operate, and no reduction in congestion.

Clearly Sound Transit CEO Rogoff and board need to be replaced  This would normally be a Seattle Times Traffic Lab "thorny issue to dig into".  Yet the day of the videos a Traffic Lab article heralded CEO Rogoff's "skipping his $21,000 raise" to his $379,000 salary.  Since then they've neglect to report on the "issue".

My candidacy for King County Executive is an attempt to make up for that failure.