Ross: WSDOT audit proves your tolling concerns were valid

Taken from Thursday’s Seattle’s Morning News with Dave Ross.

All of you who have complained about mistakes in your Good to Go toll bills, the latest state audit shows you are right.

Between July of 2014 and March 2015, 175,000 bills bounced back because of bad addresses; another 800,000 are still delayed, according to a report from the Washington State Auditor’s Office. Those numbers are fairly shocking, but Patty Rubstello, who heads the tolling division of the Washington Department of Transportation, told KIRO Radio’s Jason Rantz Wednesday that, as big as those number seem to be, they only represent a small portion of the total number of tolls across the system.

“They refer to 94 percent of tolls (that) are being collected and that’s just to get through the toll bill process,” she said. “We’re actually up at 98 percent.”

Related: Embarrassing auditor report identifies WSDOT incompetence

The overall problems with tolling represent less than one-third of one percent of all toll trips, Rubstello says. She adds that these problems are all part of the normal learning curve.

“We started with 520 tolling, then we needed to move into 405 tolling, so there’s been a lot of big initiative(s) and we’re a start-up organization,” she said. “I think we’re now at the point where we can focus on in some of these efficiencies and get those things implemented.”

One of the problems was that some of those cameras were aimed incorrectly on the old 520 bridge because the bridge deck bobbed around in rough weather so the cameras would miss the license plate. With the new bridge, those cameras are firmly mounted on the shore.

Another little surprise from the auditor’s report: The department has requested and received funding from the legislature to procure a new tolling collection system, which would need to not only collect tolls but also ferry ticketing.

In other words, now that they’ve gotten a handle on the current tolling system, the state plans to install a whole new tolling system. But because they’ve learned from the mistakes from this one, it should go a lot more smoothly and it should include the ferries, too.

By the way, the 6 percent of tolls that go uncollected here in Washington, the department says that is far better than the national average, which is up to 35 percent of tolls that go uncollected.

And here’s a figure that should impress you: Over 4.5 years, the state has collected $425 million in tolls on the Tacoma Narrows, 520 and Highway 167, of which only $39 million went to the tolling company.

That’s a nice little profit. No figures yet, though, on the 405 toll lanes.

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