Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
The Whitman County Public Works Department and County Commissioners will consider area paved roads that may need work as the biennial state County Road Administration Board (CRAB) submission period approaches.
Counties around the state submit proposals for funding every other year, with a deadline in January.
Mark Storey, Public Works director, asked commissioners for input at their regular session Nov. 4.
Two years ago, Whitman County submitted for and received funding of $2.5 million to go to three projects: $420,000 for partial funding of Pullman Airport Road reconstruction, $400,000 for overlay work in and near Johnson and $1.5 million for concluding funding of three miles of Hume Road reconstruction.
“Is there a road that you believe we should look at to see if there is a chance of it being competitive for reconstruction money?” Storey last week asked commissioners.
The CRAB program takes $45 million every two years in state gas tax money to fund qualifying paved road work around Washington.
The board's 20 employees take the submissions and rate them according to criteria such as traffic accidents, how much freight a route may carry, traffic counts and other factors.
Storey is a member of the state board which lists rankings according to scores.
Part of Whitman County's 2020 request will be for at least part of the remaining $3.108 million for Pullman Airport Road reconstruction, which the CRAB board is committed to, because of a policy to fully fund something it begins to in the previous biennium.
The CRAB program was originally created by the Washington legislature in 1965 for oversight of the state's 39 county road departments.
In 1985, the county part of state gas taxes was transferred to CRAB, the same time the agency became the overseer of a state database of nearly 40,000 roads and 3,300 bridges.
Since its inception the CRAB agency has funded 1,083 projects, for a total of $652 million.
The CRAB formula for distribution of gas taxes is updated every two years to account for changes in population, mileage and costs.
Garth Meyer is a former Whitman County Gazette reporter.
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