Spokane City Council member Jon Snyder wants to take city administrators to task on creating a pedestrian master plan. Already this week he presented his ordinance that would dissolve the six-year transportation funding pool if the city fails to create a pedestrian plan.
The city council is the governing board for the Transportation Benefit District, a corporation funded by the city’s $20 vehicle license fee for the purpose of paying for street repairs. Ten percent of the revenue is earmarked for the city’s pedestrian program, but Jon Snyder says creation of a pedestrian master plan has fallen to the wayside. He says his ordinance lays a hammer to make sure it gets done.
Snyder: “If we don’t get this council to pas the pedestrian master plan by the end of 2015, the Transportation Benefit District will dissolve. That’s 2.5 million dollars a year for street funding that will just go away.”
He says when Mayor David Condon took over his administration stopped work on the ped plan.
Mayor David Condon said earlier this month his administration is already proposing projects that are multi-modal, and says he’s confident his team will put a pedestrian plan together.
Snyder’s ordinance would dissolve the TBD if the city has no pedestrian plan by the end of 2015, and it’s up for a vote Monday. He says there are too many pedestrian and bike related deaths in the city and its time to improve safety.
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