The following is written by Sumner Mayor Dave Enslow:

I’m concerned about our roads.  According to our recent Comprehensive Plan Survey, you are concerned too.  You listed roads and traffic as the most important issues facing Sumner.

The challenge is that we’re not really in control of our own destiny.  Sumner has done excellent work lately to get the grant funding to tackle big transportation projects: replacing the Bridge Street bridge, resurfacing the East Valley Highway, improving the 136th/Valentine Corridor, improving the Traffic & Main intersection, widening Stewart Road….  But, all those were built with grants or assistance that came from the State, and that funding source is in great jeopardy.

We’ve all been reading about the financial challenges facing our State.  A lot of things at the State are underfunded.  The challenge is that funding doesn’t just appear.  It comes from somewhere, and many experts agree that it could come from funding for cities or from roads and transportation funds.  This shift would solve one problem, but we all have to be aware that it will also create others.

The Association of Washington Cities has produced a short video that really sums up the challenge in our State about funding roads.  It’s called The Ugly Truth, and you can look at it on our website.  We’ve done fairly well keeping up our roads in Sumner, but we’ll always have more to do.  We need to repave 142nd soon, and Valley Avenue is a problem.  How can we possibly tackle these if there is no funding left at the State level?  That doesn’t even touch the road projects led by the State, including widening and/or finishing Highway 167 and finally improving all our outdated interchanges with Highway 410.

There are no answers yet, and the State’s predicament is ours as well. It’s good for you and me to know the questions and understand the challenges as, hopefully, the State begins to seek answers.