Studded tires damage Kent streets

In response to the Nov. 16 letter by Sandra Gill, I do not believe that the city and the City Council properly tried to convince and justify to the people that the (property) tax (levy for streets and parks) for all was needed. That is why it failed.

First off the tire foot print on the roads is not as heavy by the trucks (16 & 18 wheeler’s) as is assumed by the public. It is affected however by the “overloaded” trucks and that is really a very small percentage of vehicles.

So where is all that damage coming from? It is coming from passenger vehicles. All you have to do is pay attention to the width of the damage. It is not wide-spaced, double-tire damage but it is the width of passenger vehicles and it comes from studded tires.

So this is where the Gill letter is misinformed. It is too bad that the city cannot ban them and the state can but won’t (yet), unless the next time Olympia gets together extreme pressure is put on them to do so by the public.

In many of the states that have far worse weather than we do here, they are banned for this reason. As a side note here even the State Patrol does not use studded tires in the passes, they do use tires that the rubber gets softer as the temperature gets colder. After having used them for several years, they have provided me with as good or better traction than studs.

Also if you or anyone you know has studs on their vehicle go and look at their garage or where they park and you will have an OMG (Oh My God) moment as I did. If the chains required signs are up, I do not care what kind of tires you have on you are still required to put them on.

So now where does the city get the money for road repairs? It has to be felt across the board. First, a huge increase on the sale of studded tires; second an across the board increase in the B&O (business and occupation) and property taxes.

This is where I disagree with the Gill letter again – the public should take the heat for the damage that is caused by primarily passenger vehicles.

Also it is how we drive all the time trying to avoid potholes because this causes our tires to bounce and create the next pothole in line and mess up our front end alignment, then add to this the empty trucks that drive faster than needed and they bounce even more than the cars.

Do I want higher taxes? Absolutely not, I am an average homeowner in the city and am not associated with any business but we the public must be reasonable with businesses because if we stick it to them then they will move away along with the jobs that they provide and associated taxes that they pay.

Then where does the tax base money come from? You got it, we will get a far bigger tax bill. This is a case of damned if you do and damned if you don’t.

– Fred Dawn