Gavels banged down on March 12th, marking the end of the 2026 supplemental legislative session.
The 60 day session saw hundreds of bills introduced, committee work sessions, long hours of debate (including a history-making 24+ hour debate on the millionaires income tax), some political jostling, and a good deal of bipartisanship.
In the transportation world, the final transportation budget appropriates $16.6 billion, a $1.2 billion increase over the enacted 2025 budget. The majority of the increase in funding is driven towards Washington State Department of Transportation maintenance and preservation, reappropriations, and increases in maintenance costs.
So, how did the agency's legislative priorities fare?
Albeit small, the Local Road Program benefitted from the budget increase. Specifically, the Legislature provides an additional $1.26 million to our new local road program, allowing us to reimburse design costs to counties in the 2025-2027 biennium. Additional details will be published on our website and shared out to our county partners as they become available. A support hour is available on March 24th to answer questions for those working on applications.
CRAB also receives $2.5 million in new funding for our one-time bridge load rating grant program. In 2024, we shared about a major update that the tens of millions of federal dollars Washington State receives from FHWA for bridge rehabilitation and replacement were at risk and we had volunteered to be a part of the solution. This load rating program will benefit small cities and counties as they work to meet new Federal Highway Administration load rating requirements. We will be reaching out to our county partners one-on-one with details.
Finally, CRAB will receive $30 million to assist counties impacted by the flood and storm event in December 2025. Over half of Washington’s 39 counties sustained damage during the history making event, many counties seeing millions in infrastructure damage to roads and bridges. This new money will allow us to offer loans to those counties most impacted by the December event. We will update stakeholders in the coming weeks with more information as it becomes available!
Overall, it was a very positive session for the County Road Administration Board. As we work to advance the success and accountability of Washington’s county road departments, we rely on the support of our Legislative branch to carry out this mission. We would like to extend our gratitude to our Legislature, counties, legislative and executive staff, and all of our partners who work tirelessly to affect positive change for Washington counties.
We are looking forward to putting Washington tax dollars to work in 2026!
