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02/11/2010: "Ranker Bill Expands Use Of Electric Vehicles On County Roads"

(Is it an NEV if it also has a gas generator?)
Councilman Bob Myhr may soon get his wish that NEVs (neighborhood electronic vehicles) have a free range in the county by making a change in state law to allow more county roads to be traveled by them.

Currently NEVs are restricted to roads with thirty-five miles and hour or less speed limit; but many of the county roads have a forty-five miles per hour limit. Myhr has repeatedly asked the County to go to Olympia and ask the legislature to "adopt a policy to allow any licensed vehicle to use county roads", and when Ranker was a member of the council, he supported Myhr's position that a change was needed.



Myhr argued that what was needed was a change in the law to bump the speed limit restriction up to 45 mph -which, of course, just so happens to be the top speed limits on county roads.

Now that Councilman Ranker is Senator Kevin Ranker, he was able to go bat on Myhr’s issue, and he received the necessary support of Senator Mary Haugen, the powerful Chair of the Transportation Committee, and a member of the Rural Economic Development Rules Committee, and also from twelve other senators who joined in to support Ranker’s proposed bill to give San Juan County an out in the law.

Wednesday evening Ranker’s bill was unanimously approved on the Senate floor by a 47-0 vote and now heads to the House for further consideration.

Senate Bill 6346 will allow residents of San Juan County to operate NEVs and medium-speed electronic vehicles on city streets and county roads -that are not state routes- provided the road has a speed limit of 45 mph or less.

“Some people who own NEVs want to get from their home to a grocery store, but they cannot make the trip because they would have driven on a road with a speed limit of 45 mph for a couple of miles,” said Ranker. “This allows them to make that short trip.”

This is not the first time SJC has received preferential treatment from the state legislators. Years ago when San Juan County wanted to form a library taxing district, the Orcas library opposed having county taxing districts, so San Juan and Lopez island went to the state and asked the legislature to changed the law to allow “counties comprised of islands” to have individual island districts. As a result both SJI and Lopez were allowed to put the matter to a vote of the people, who approved the measure in landslide votes. Orcas later joined in and formed their own district.