MUKILTEO—As candidates are in the final stretch of the 2024 Primary Election season, the Lynnwood Times had the opportunity to meet with Representative Rick Larsen (WA-02) on one of his canvassing walks in District 2, this one in Mukilteo.
“I love how beautiful it is,” Larsen replied when asked what he loves most about District 2 at Red Cup Café in Old Town Mukilteo. “You have Mount Baker, Mount Three Fingers, Mount Pilchuck, all within view and Mount Rainer as well. You have the mountains; you have the water…it is everything most members want in a district.
Over the last two years, Larsen has secured billions of dollars from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), supported the passage of the bipartisan FAA Reauthorization Bill and the Migratory Bird Conservation Act, and is now working on legislation to fund both county drug task forces and provide job skills training for those recovering from addiction.
Larsen shared that it is the exceptional work of his staff that allows him to stay connected with over 750,000 residents, responding to their concerns, and setting up appointments to discuss an issue. Congressional District Two includes all of Whatcom, Island, Skagit, and San Juan counties, and territory west of I-5 in Snohomish County from Edmonds in the south to Stanwood in the north. Each region has a distinct characteristic and need.
“It [District 2] has more developed areas such as in Everett and Mukilteo; you have rural areas that bring a lot of different issues into my work as a member of congress,” Larsen said.
One key issue that traverses each region within District 2 is the fentanyl crisis. Between 2022 and 2023, Washington state seen the largest percentage increase of drug overdose deaths in the United States.
Since 2020, more than 650 people in Snohomish County have died of opioid-related overdoses. In 2022, more than seventy-five percent of Washington’s overall drug overdose deaths were linked to opioids. Even though the United States saw a three percent decline in overdose deaths overall during this period, deaths in Washington state increased by more than 21 percent.
Lummi Nation Chairman Tony Hillaire testified to the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs in November 2023 that more than 70 Tribal members currently live in squalor with no sanitation facilities at a homeless camp in Bellingham. Therefore, some tribes have declared fentanyl and the opioid crisis a public health emergency.
According to the Tulalip Tribes, more than 63 members have died from fentanyl overdoses since 2017. In 2023 alone, the Lummi Nation had seven fentanyl overdose-related deaths, with five of those occurring in just a two-month span from September to October.
VA Puget Sound, which treats 25 percent of veterans who reside in Washington state, cares for approximately 155,000 veterans, of which, 1,048 (0.68 percent) have a current diagnosis of opioid use disorder (OUD).
The approach to tackling the opioid crisis, Larsen said, must be a comprehensive framework focusing on four pillars: prevention, interdiction, treatment, and recovery.
Larsen shared that he and his staff are drafting a bill to allocate additional funding to drug task forces throughout District 2.
“These are women and men who go undercover to track down the networks in our communities,” Larsen said. “They try to build the cases to hold those people accountable who bring this crap into our communities.”
A second bill will focus on workforce development programs to retrain those who are coming out of addiction and recovery.
To address Tribal nations concerns, another bill aims to “plug the law enforcement loophole that allow drug trackers to operate on Indian reservations.”
“Tribal law enforce can be as active as federal law enforcement,” Larsen added.
He supports giving tribal authorities powers to act against nontribal people who are bringing fentanyl into their communities – e.g. giving them authority to convict drug offenses that occur on tribal lands.
When asked about cutting off the fentanyl supply at the U.S. Border, Larsen explained that a vast majority of the drug coming into the country are from legitimate ports of entry.
According to a recent Department of Homeland Security press release on fentanyl, “more than 90% of interdicted fentanyl is stopped at Ports of Entry (POE) where cartels attempt to smuggle it primarily in vehicles driven by U.S. citizens.”
“Drug trafficking doesn’t start at the border and doesn’t end at the border,” Larsen said sharing with the Lynnwood Times how it is an international supply chain issue. “We need to work with Central and South American partners as best we can to stop the traffickers there and continue to invest in the tools for Customer Border Protection and the DEA at the border. We also need to support of local law enforcement throughout the country.”
Holding Boeing accountable to safety
Boeing is the nation’s largest exporter and has a global workforce of 170,000 with approximately 66,000 employed in Washington state. It has contracts with at least 12,000 suppliers around the world of which over 1,000 are in Washington state.
Aerospace is a $70 billion industry in the state employing some 130,000 according to the Washington State Department of Commerce. In 2022, Boeing paid more than $200 million in taxes to the state.
After Alaska Airlines Flight 1282’s non-fatal incident involving a cabin door blowing off mid-flight on January 5, 2024, due to four key bolts missing, according to a preliminary report from the NTSB, Boeing has been under intense scrutiny by federal regulators.
“There are a lot of good economic reasons to support the women and men who work at Boeing,” Larsen said when asked about Boeing’s financial outlook and it being an economic driver in his district. “I do not think Boeing is in danger of going away, that said, they are in danger of being second place [to Airbus] and none of us want to see that. So, what Boeing needs to do is get back to its roots of being an engineering company – to design, engineer, and build the best and safest airplanes in the world.”
The Alaska Airlines incident resulted in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) temporarily grounding, for weeks, similarly configured Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft to undergo inspections. The action by the FAA was reminiscent of the March 2019 grounding of all Boeing 737-MAX aircraft shortly after Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302, a 737-MAX 8 aircraft, crashed six minutes after takeoff from Addis Adaba killing all 157 people aboard. Just months earlier, on October 29, 2018, Lion Air Flight 610 crashed into the Java Sea 12 minutes after takeoff, killing all 189 passengers and crew. Both 737-MAX 8 aircraft, and the Boeing 737 Max 9, were only a few months old at the time of their incidents.
“The leadership there saw airplanes as a way to produce returns for shareholders,” Larsen told the Lynnwood Times. “For the last five or six years, the leadership at Boeing has discovered that, one, that catches up with you, and second, that actually building safe airplanes is perhaps the most consistent way to produce shareholder value. People pay for safety, and you also get rewarded for safety.”
I'm encouraged about the announcement of Kelly Ortberg as the new President & CEO of @Boeing. Mr. Ortberg is a mechanical engineer. I hope that means he will ensure that his top message for everyone is building the best airplane means building the safest airplane in the world. https://t.co/zV6W9WlUL8
— Rep. Rick Larsen (@RepRickLarsen) July 31, 2024
On March 4, 2024, the FAA “halted production expansion of the Boeing 737 MAX,” as a financial incentive for the company to address what the FAA calls, “production quality issues.” A six-week FAA audit of the Boeing 737 Max 9 production line found multiple “manufacturing process control, parts handling and storage, and product control” problems. Regulators also required the aircraft manufacturer to develop a comprehensive plan within 90 days to address the “systemic quality-control issues.”
On Thursday, May 30, the FAA accepted Boeing’s comprehensive “Product Safety and Quality Plan,” that aims to tighten supplier oversite and manufacturing processes.
Larsen informed the Lynnwood Times that his staff is reviewing a copy of Boeing’s 90-day safety plan to hold both the FAA and Boeing accountable.
“I want to assure the folks in the Second District and throughout the region that we are going to hold Boeing accountable to safety and that we are going to hold the FAA accountable to ensuring Boeing is accountable to safety,” Larsen emphasized.
In June Larsen held a roundtable at Paine Field with local aerospace industry leaders on the impacts of the passage of the bipartisan FAA Reauthorization Bill for the region. The bill was signed into law by President Joe Biden in May.
“The age of George Jetson is here, and the FAA needs to catch up with that,” Larsen said.
The bill sets the stage for aviation policy over the next 5 years not just for safety, Larsen added, but also for innovation.
A few highlights from the bill are:
- Prevention of runway incursions by expanding ground surveillance and detection equipment at large and medium hub airports to better inform air traffic controllers of potential danger
- Ensures that foreign aircraft repair stations are subject to the same standards as American repair stations
- Provides funding for state, local and Tribal governments to use drones to visually inspect, repair and maintain critical infrastructure, and invests in the training of the workforce to use these advanced technologies
Larsen emphasized a major provision in the bill will now address training for handling wheelchairs.
“We have seen video of wheelchairs being thrown around, and on the luggage mover racks just being launched hitting the cement floor before getting loaded onto the plane,” Larsen said.
The provision will now address training for handling wheelchairs. He explained to the Lynnwood Times, that too often damaged wheelchairs during flight immobilize passengers at airport and the indignity they suffer as a result of the careless action by others.
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law
As the lead Democrat on the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee, Larsen helped secure $8.2 billion in Bipartisan Infrastructure Law investment in Washington state infrastructure, with more than 600 specific projects identified for funding statewide.
“What I am most excited about [BIL] is that this bill will be the single largest investment in transit that we have ever seen and as a result; the single largest investment in helping our local transit agencies transition to low and no emission vehicles,” Larsen said.
Larsen added, “The BIL today brought billions back to Washington state to improve the transportation system, making it greener and more accessible.”
President Biden signed the BIL on November 15, 2021. The BIL focused on six objectives:
- Facilitating trade and mitigating future supply chain challenges
- Creating jobs and growing the economy
- Incorporating sustainability features to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
- Improving the human experience
- Strengthening community livability and advancing community goals
- Becoming a model for sustainability and innovation
Larsen informed the Lynnwood Times that for the Clinton side of the Mukilteo Ferry System, BIL ferry dollars are being used to build electric charging for the upcoming hybrid-electric ferries as part of Washington State Ferries 2050 plan to a emission-free fleet by 2050.
Monies from the BIL will also be used by Community Transit, Island Transit, and school districts to pilot hydrogen and electric buses and/or transition to low emission vehicles.
Island Transit was recently awarded approximately $15 million to buy hydrogen fuel cell buses, which will replace diesel buses on Whidbey Island.
The provision is most impactful to local communities, Larsen added, stating that BIL will now fund sidewalks and multimodal improvements.
BIL dollars administered by the WSDOT is investing nearly $12 million in federal-aid highway funds to rehabilitate the SR 529 Snohomish River Bridge in Everett. Lynnwood will now construct a new six-lane, multimodal bridge over Interstate 5, thanks to BIL dollars, that will reduce congestion and build a more accessible transportation system as the city expects to add tens of thousands of residents by 2040.
