Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson on Tuesday asked the Trump administration for up to $173 million to deal with damage to roads, levees and more from flooding in December, and prepare for similar future disasters.
The preliminary damage estimate for the state is $182.3 million, Ferguson said.
“This historic flooding resulted in, we believe, the largest dollar amount of public infrastructure damage in Washington state in more than four decades,” he said in a press conference Tuesday, while cautioning this figure will increase as officials continue to assess the toll.
Of that total, the state can ask the federal government to cover three-quarters. That’s roughly $137 million. The state has to cover the rest of those costs of clearing debris and repairing bridges, public buildings, utilities, parks and other infrastructure.
This doesn’t include damage to certain federal and state highways, including U.S. 2. The most significant destruction from the record flooding was on this major east-west crossing over the Cascades. For over two weeks, a 49-mile stretch of U.S. 2 between Skykomish and Leavenworth was closed amid debris slides and washouts that destroyed parts of the roadway. The state fully reopened the highway last week.
Ferguson said the state will be seeking Federal Highway Administration funding to address damage to these highways, but it’s “too soon” to estimate how much.
The governor is also seeking money from the feds to gird the state for future disasters. He cited the new floodwall in Mount Vernon that protected the Skagit County city from more devastating flooding in December.
The state can ask for this mitigation funding up to 20% of its total damage estimate, Ferguson said. That would be a maximum of over $36 million in this case.
He said the toll from the flooding “would have been even worse, significantly worse, without infrastructure to protect against flooding.”
Washington is still awaiting word from President Donald Trump and the Federal Emergency Management Agency on the approval of a previous major disaster declaration request Ferguson made last month. As part of that previous ask, the Democratic governor sought $21.3 million in federal aid to help flood victims.
Tuesday’s request for federal dollars to deal with infrastructure damage and prepare for future storms is separate. The deadline for submitting the plea was Wednesday.
The record-breaking flooding forced evacuation orders for over 100,000 Washingtonians and damaged nearly 4,000 homes, according to the state. Almost 400 people needed to be rescued. One person died. Thirty-three rivers reached flood stage, and three broke records, though not quite to the catastrophic level some feared.
Ferguson didn’t have a timeline for a decision from the federal government on his requests for individual and infrastructure assistance. Trump has made a point of not greenlighting aid for Democratic-led states in some instances, including when he denied federal funding for Washington in the aftermath of the 2024 bomb cyclone.
The governor expects the Republican and Democratic leaders of the state House and Senate caucuses to send a letter to Trump supporting the request. He’s asked the congressional delegation, which includes two Republicans, to do the same. The delegation penned a letter endorsing Ferguson’s previous ask last month.
Meanwhile, state Attorney General Nick Brown and a group of other states asked a federal judge in Massachusetts on Tuesday to enforce a previous court order to restore funding to a program sending more than $150 million to Washington for disaster mitigation. Among the projects left in limbo is levee and floodwall construction in Aberdeen and Hoquiam.
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