BREMERTON — Voters will be asked Nov. 8 to decide whether or not a passenger-only fast ferry system should be built.

The Kitsap Transit board of commissioners voted 7-2 in favor of putting the issue to vote during the board’s April 5 meeting.

Board members Becky Erickson and Ed Stern voted against the measure. Board members Charlotte Garrido, Robert Gelder, Richard Huddy, Patty Lent, Rob Putaansuu, Ed Wolfe and Val Tollefson voted for it.

Explaining his “no” vote, Stern said the 3/10ths sales tax was regressive. Stern said the POF tax base should be more narrow and tied more closely to the areas that will more directly benefit.

Erickson said she was “angry” about the POF plan.

She said a small group of influential citizens “might have influenced a lot of the data that we were considering,” and said polling questions on the POF were biased to ensure a desired answer from those polled.

She said the POF would cost $355 million over 20 years.

“That’s a third of a billion,” Erickson said. She said that money could be better used other ways, such as having free Sunday bus service, improving vehicle congestion problems in Gorst and Silverdale or could be used to make a bus rapid-transit system for Highway 305.

Putaansuu said, “Last week, I had the privilege of riding the light rail to University of Washington for a meeting. I see this POF service as our ‘light rail.’”

Sound Transit had much larger transit systems being developed and, “our proposal is very modest in comparison …  and the system is successful on the other side of the water. Growth is coming to Kitsap County and let’s plan for it without more cars.”

Gelder said people seemed to be evenly split on the POF issue. He said a privately run fast ferry could not operate without a subsidy.

“It’s hard for transit systems to function without some level of subsidy. The hard part is, without the subsidy it wasn’t reliable. Then you couldn’t change commuter behaviors, and commuter behaviors are huge in the success of any form of mass transit.”

“All transit on some level is subsidized. We do it now — we pay sales tax, each and every one of us — for the bus service that’s in our community. But yet, the majority of the local citizens don’t use bus service. But again, it’s a proven tool for urbanizing centers. We all subsidize road infrastructure but we don’t all drive,” Gelder said.

“POF service is just one mode of, hopefully, a network of transportation options because the best systems have multiple options and … some level of redundancy in order to make the system efficient.”

Gelder said transit and affordable housing were interconnected. He said people needed a way to get to Seattle without having to deal with heavy automobile congestion on Highway 305.

“Now is the time to begin investing in other mass-transit concepts like bus rapid transit. Right-of-way … is only going to get more expensive.”

Lent said the POF vote has been more than 10 years in the making in order to resolve questions about wake problems. She said tests were done on a fast ferry in several configurations, including those with fully weighted-down ferries.

Lent said about $1 million could be saved by having King County run the POF, and that the savings would be enough to fund Sunday bus service.

Garrido echoed Gelder’s “systems thinking” approach.

“I think it’s really important to look at transportation as a whole within Kitsap County and across our borders.”

Garrido said the heavy automobile congestion problems that Seattle has was going to be Kitsap County’s future as well.

“That is also our future and it’s not a very pleasant one,” Garrido said.

Garrido said she often uses walk-on ferries for Seattle trips.

“We really do support the mass transit idea of leaving our cars behind and traveling to many of our meetings, especially across the water, without cars.”

Huddy said the Bremerton city council favored the POF vote.

“We feel it’s time,” Huddy said.

Tollefson said the POF plan wasn’t perfect, but that it was the best plan to date.

[LINK: Learn more at kitsapferries.com ]

Robert Parker speaks to the Kitsap Transit board about the passenger only ferry plan during a meeting April 5 at the Norm Dicks Government Center in Bremerton.

The board listened to about 90 minutes of public comment from 34 speakers prior to the vote. Some of the speakers and their comments are below:

• Larry Croix of Port Orchard said the current POF plan was “unworkable.”

“The known factors are enough to say it won’t work and the unknowables are extensive and profound.”

“Once started, it will be discovered that more boats are required for Bremerton and that … means that the POF will become all about Bremerton for as long as it survives,” and the rest of county gets nothing, he said.

“Untold millions will have been flushed down the drain … the lack of respect you’ve shown toward the voters of this county is profound.”

• Mike Miller, with the Bremerton architecture firm Rice Fergus Miller, said he moved to Bremerton in 1999 because of the POF, which was operating at the time. He worked in Seattle at the time, but wanted to live in Kitsap. RFM now employs 45 professionals in Bremerton as a result of that move, he said. Thus, the POF brought professional jobs, which support other local businesses.

“I’m a direct example of what can happen when transportation is made easy and convenient and fast,” he said.

• Sonny Woodward, a “ferry cheerleader,” said voters should decide. Woodward said Seattle, Everett and Tacoma were doing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of work on their waterfronts, but, “then I thought, ‘What’s Kitsap County doing?’ And so I wondered, maybe it’s time for us to join the 21st century.”

• Steve Rice with RFM architecture favored the POF vote. “If POF service is restored and is healthy … it will change the face of downtown Bremerton and bring it back to a state of complete health. We have a long ways to go. Downtown Bremerton is not economically healthy or viable in the way that we would all like it.”

• Roger Gay of south Kitsap said Kitsap Transit was putting the “cart before the horse” and should focus more on improving Sunday bus service before doing anything with a POF.

• Matt Murphy, executive director of the Port Orchard Chamber of Commerce said, “Our mission at the Port Orchard Chamber of Commerce is to promote business and encourage community.”

“From Manchester, you can see downtown Seattle. We are so close you can touch it. We are poised, we are on the edge of an opportunity to make some great inroads in economic development.”

Murphy said Kitsap had the affordable housing people needed and that a POF could make it easier for people to come to Kitsap County.

• Cathy Tomko of Bremerton said she favored the POF, but not if Kitsap Transit ran it. She said Kitsap County could not afford the POF. People at the top do not care about people at the bottom, she said.

• Sharon Adams has lived in Kitsap County since 1998 and said she used to ride the POF.

“I remember using it and I miss it.”

She said a POF was needed for Bremerton to grow.

“I believe a fast ferry will bring a flow back and forth from Seattle to Bremerton … I believe the third time will be a charm.”

• Alice Tawresey, a Bainbridge Island resident and a founding member of the Kitsap Transit board, favored the POF.

“At the time … when Kitsap Transit was founded, people were not in favor of Kitsap Transit at all, either. They thought that it was not necessary for a county like this. They didn’t want it. And the vote was controversial but it did pass,” Tawresey said.

“I think folks on Bainbridge Island who have supported the last two votes are in favor of this service because they believe that it will improve the traffic coming through the island and congesting access. If you’ve ever tried to get off the island in the evening commutes or on the island in the morning, you know that you can spend an extra 45 minutes sitting on the highway. Having an alternative from Kingston and from Bremerton will be very beneficial to the flow of traffic on the island.”

“This will be a benefit to commerce. It will be a benefit to residents and I would urge you to put it on the ballot so Bainbridge Island can be in favor of it again.”

• Kellen Able of Port Orchard said that until last weekend, he had not been to downtown Bremerton in a decade. He said he couldn’t believe how much downtown had changed.

“I saw businesses doing business on the weekend with young families. I saw people walking around, I saw busy bars and restaurants. I couldn’t believe it. I was completely blown away with how much different it is than 10 years ago. I think it’s a sign of what’s changing in Bremerton and I think the (passenger only) ferry is exactly the type of thing that’s going to encourage that.”

• Tim Mathes of Port Orchard said the Rich Passage 1 POF boat had cracks in the hydrofoil and was “hazardous and dangerous to the public. I don’t think we should even consider that boat for service.”

• Jamie Forsythe of Bremerton said she would vote for the POF, but favored 4/10th of a percent tax instead of 3/10th of a percent.

• Teresa Osinski with Kitsap Building Association wanted the vote.

“The Kitsap Building Association does believe infrastructure is essential to healthy communities. Healthy communities are not just our physical body health, but the health of our families — our economic condition,” she said.

• Larry Myers of Tracyton said Rich Passage beachfront property owners would sue due to fast ferry wake.

• Fourth generation Bremertonian Wes Larson remembered his great grandfather’s stories about the mosquito fleet. He said the fleet had 41 points of departure throughout Kitsap County, and that the county benefitted from the active trade with Seattle. Larson said Seattle had the jobs that Kitsap County residents needed.

Larson said that he had earlier opposed Sound Transit, but has since changed his mind.

“We thought these (Sound Transit) projects were too expensive, too big; we couldn’t possibly do it. Well, those projects were accomplished and they’re vital connections for the city of Seattle and they’re going to further improve transportation. Our ferries are our ‘Sound Transit.’ Our waterways are our highways. Connections to Seattle will grow our economy and will help us create jobs … lets have the courage to take this step forward.”

• Robert Parker of Port Orchard said the POF process was being too influenced by shady groups.

“The system has not been open to the public. I think they have been very selective of who they let input, who they haven’t let input to the point that when they were doing the roundtables they excluded council members from participating.”

“Some of those council members represent thousands of people and they’re not allowed input?”

• Michaelene Manion of Port Orchard said it was an “all-day affair” to travel to Silverdale via Kitsap Transit. She said Kitsap Transit needed to improve bus routes and Sunday and evening service.

• Tiffany Diaz De Leon said she had a “strong desire to have a fast ferry system from Southworth or Bremerton to Seattle. However, that desire stops when I know that taxpayers are going to have to pay for my ride.”

She said private corporations like Amazon, Starbucks or Clearwater Casino might be able to make a water taxi service.

Her advice: “Privatize, Uberize and subsidize nothing.”

• Roy Runyon said people wanted better bus service more than a “mission creep” POF system.

“I do not support having the taxpayer subsidize this luxury service,” Runyon said. Puget Sound already had a good ferry system he said, and a POF would only compete with a service that was already provided.

• Linda Simpson did not favor the POF vote. Instead, Kitsap Transit “should focus on expanding the hours it operates: Sunday service and buses running until midnight every day of the week rather than spending millions and millions of dollars on a passenger-only ferry.”