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02/24/2006: "Hearings Held On Fare Increases"

(Hearing in Friday Harbor)

Washington State Ferry's brass came to Orcas and San Juan islands to receive input on the new proposed changes to the ferry system, which primarily consist of increases in fares, and changes on how tickets may be obtained. Attendance at the meetings was less than at the last set of meetings, but the old anger and frustrations with the system in general, and the fare increases in particular, were still topics of concern for some members of the public.

Dwight Lewis of Lopez was one of the first speakers on San Juan, having taken an earlier afternoon ferry to Friday Harbor (no meetings had been scheduled for Lopez), he was clearly charged up on the subject, and had the audience laughing with his examples of what he labeled as an unfairness in the fare structure when contrasted to other ferry routes in the system; a concern also forcefully presented earlier by the first speaker of the evening, Jan Osborn, who compared the SJ fares to those of Bremerton, as an example of how the riders of SJ are paying too much, for too little.

While the Ferry officials stated the reasons for the fare increases were directly related to a combination of the voters approving Initiative 695, which cut taxes on vehicles, and the high costs of fuel, Helen King asked if it was true that WSF had proposed building a new terminal building at the Anacortes dock at an estimated cost of 120 million dollars. She was informed that they had so proposed. There was no discussion on how much was spent to produce study and the proposal.

The WSF officials responded to questions with facts-and-figures, backed by statistics, but it was difficult to determine if they were convinced by any of the arguments from the floor; however they did point out that changes had been made as a result of public input from the last hearings, and they intended to once again review all testimony for possible suggestions for changes to the proposal when it is presented by the Tariff Fare Committee on March 3rd in Seattle, at which time a decision will be made as to what in the proposal will go into effect on May 1st of this year.