Short of funds, highway plan revised

By Karin Burke | The Daily Journal

Published Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Rick West, County Engineer, is asking residents of Otter Tail county to “Take a good look at our county highways today, because they are in the best shape you are going to see them.” Meaning, he said, the county will move from construction to maintenance for the foreseeable future without more money from a source other than state or federal dollars.

Prior to this year, project goals were to bring highways to a 9-ton load level. In the revised plan, goals will shift to maintenance and resurfacing.

“Filling ruts, fill in cracks, and inch and a half of resurfacing. This is new and different for our highway improvement plan, and it will look like a decrease in the level of services to the people who use our roads,” West said.

“It’s time that we consider other funding options, such as a wheelage tax or local bonding,” he said, noting that many counties have already made such moves. “This (projected) campaign will not maintain the roads that we have. ”What level of services to you want?” West said. “It’s a question of what we want to do as a county. If we don’t like the level we’ve got, we’re going to need more revenue.”

The revised five-year plan will be brought before the county board in mid February.

The county’s highway and bridge improvement program drafted for 2004-2009 is undergoing major revision, reflecting the increase in the cost of petrol and resultant inability to meet project goals within the current budget. Current levels of funding are estimated to cover overlay projects, but not major reconstruction projects originally laid out in the original plan.

West spoke at a public information meeting Jan. 25 at the Government Services Center in Fergus Falls, detailing preliminary changes to the five-year Highway and Bridge Program. He will present the revisions again during a public information meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday, in New York Mills.

Highway and bridge improvement plans are typically laid out with a five-year draft, he said. The proposed revisions, detailed in the public information meetings, reflects a significant change to the plan and a new five year plan for 2007-2012.

“There is normally a review of the improvement plan every three years. The reason for the review at just two years reflects the need for a look at construction costs,” West said.

Otter Tail County has 917

miles of county state highways, funded by the state fuel tax and license fees, 134 miles of county highways funded by local taxes, and 142 bridges funded by county, state and city funds.

Federal funding for transportation is slated to remain at ’06 levels, due to fiscal pressure and rising oil costs. Governor Pawlenty has suggested that he will veto raising state taxes for transportation. If monies from the state and the national level do not increase at a level with the increase of oil costs, funding for county highways falls short of projected budgets.

West notes that Otter Tail County has a history of a strong highway system, and that as state and federal funding have shifted to a grant-award type dispersal, as opposed to earlier flat dollar amounts per county, Otter Tail County has done rather well.

“We are a growing area, as opposed to other parts of Minnesota. We are a heavily-traveled area, with major transportation needs,” he said. “We are more successful in receiving funds because of our high traffic volume” he said.

But having done well in the past can’t counter the dollar shortage to come. “If ’07 allocations are to stay at ’06 levels, we need to ask if we can make up the difference locally” he said.