by Hilary Niles vtdigger.org
Senate Transportation Committee chairman Sen. Dick Mazza, D-Chittenden/Grand Isle, said Tuesday he doesn’t expect to make many changes in a proposed $685 million transportation bill.
The proposal for fiscal year 2015, H.872, passed the House last week. The dollars to fund the Transportation Bill are reflected in the state’s budget bill, slated for House votes Thursday and Friday.
Agency of Transportation Secretary Brian Searles. VTDigger file photo
Transportation Secretary Brian Searles said he doesn’t expect any challenges to Gov. Peter Shumlin’s budget request for the agency in the Senate.
AOT is asking for roughly $30 million more than it received in fiscal year 2014, which ends June 30, and $141 million more than in fiscal year 2013.
Searles said transportation funding is driven by project needs combined with the availability of money from the state’s Transportation Fund and federal sources.
“We either have the money or we don’t. If we don’t, we don’t spend it,” he said.
Searles has yet to run out of projects that need funding, especially as Vermont continues to make repairs after Tropical Storm Irene struck in 2011. Searles said one-time federal recovery funds have elevated the budget in recent years. Barring more natural disasters, he anticipates a drop in federal appropriations in fiscal year 2016.
An estimated $228 million in FY15 would come from the state’s Transportation Fund, comprised largely of taxes on gas, motor vehicle purchases and other fees. More than half the budget is federally sourced, not including disaster relief.
With extreme cold in the 2013-2014 winter, the cost to repair potholes is expected to double to well over $3 million, Searles said.
That’s just a sliver of the transportation budget pie.
Other paving needs account for $115.7 million, state and interstate bridges for a combined $123.7 million, maintenance for $80.2 million and roadway costs of $50 million. FEMA grants comprise $48.6 million.
The Cross Vermont Trail Association is a $84,089 line items in the budget. If the organization can raise $240,911 of the $325,000 local match required to build a bridge connecting Montpelier and Berlin, the state has agreed to kick in the difference.
Transportation Committee member Sen. Jane Kitchel, D-Caledonia, suggested Tuesday morning that the trail association in Lamoille County might be interested in sharing some of that earmark.
Vermont local roads
One of the few controversies in the transportation bill is less about spending and more about restructuring.
The Agency of Transportation has proposed absorbing the Vermont Local Roads Program. It was set up 31 years ago through the federal government to provide municipalities with technical assistance for local transportation projects.
Local Roads director David Antone said he was surprised by the proposal to move his office to the Agency of Transportation.
“I’m not opposing having the center moved to VTrans,” Antone said. “I think this is an inevitability we should all accept. But if we’re going to do it, we should do it in a well thought-out way.”
He said a scheduled meeting for early April will be the center’s first chance to discuss with VTrans the logistics of a possible transition. Searles said all employees will be given the chance to reapply for their current positions if and when they’re moved to state offices from St. Michael’s College, which houses the program.
Searles said the idea for his agency taking over the local technical assistance program (or LTAP) surfaced this year, as the agency mulled a request to make permanent 16 temporary positions AOT created after Tropical Storm Irene. The temp employees at AOT engage in storm recovery work similar to Local Roads. If the positions are made permanent, Searles said, AOT would want to avoid duplication.
He said bringing the traditional program into the agency will allow for better coordination, and save about $91,000 per year.
Antone questions whether AOT will really be able to achieve $91,000 worth of efficiencies.
“We might actually be more efficient than a bigger program like VTrans,” he said. “But I don’t believe these numbers make a lot of difference. I think, ‘Are you still going to be able to serve the towns in the way that they want it done?’” Antone said he’d rather have that conversation than talk about $91,000, but he reported little reception in either the House or Senate Transportation committees.
The Vermont League of Cities and Towns is working with AOT to devise an approach that satisfies the agency’s goals and municipalities’ needs.
Mazza sought to assure Sen. Bob Hartwell, D-Bennington, who inquired about the restructuring on behalf of some concerned constituents.
“We will do nothing unless it provides equal or better services than they’re getting today,” Mazza said.