Attendance

Jimmy Wiseman, Kenny McBride, Richard hill, Joe Shephard, Macie Roberson, Benny McGuire, Kenny Paschall, Terry Hailey, Brad Hurley, Jimmy Williamson, Marcia Mills, Carl Holder, Linda Holder, Chris Mathis, Tommy Bradberry, John Bucy, Ken Thorne, Jim Hayes, Carl Stoppenhagen, Representative Butch Borchardt, Randy Lovett, Theresa Estes, Del Truitt, Barry Carter, Erwin White, Sandy Davis, David Pechin, James Baltimore, Don Thornton, Chuck Rychen

Purpose and Minutes

Chairman Kenny Paschall welcomed everyone to the NWTN RPO Executive Committee meeting. RPO coordinator Rob Goad then took a roll call and accepted proxy voting forms. Teresa Estes stood and introduced Randy Lovett, TDOT Deputy Commissioner of Administration to the meeting. Mr. Lovett stated “Commissioner Nicely has asked me to attend this meeting and provide you with a picture of our current financial situation at the state and federal levels”. Mr. Lovett continued with “ Our biggest issue to date is with federal rescission rates. Yet another issue we are dealing with is the monthly appropriation of funding for state DOTs as we are operating under a continuance. Rescissions used to be in the 3 to 4 million-dollar range in years past; it is now in the 80 million dollar range. Although we receive state funding, state funding remains constant and unfortunately doesn’t cover the rise in materials costs via inflation. TDOT isn’t alone in this, look at other states though and TDOT is looking good. One reason we have managed is that we are a pay-as-you-go state. Unfortunately, we have no reason to believe that this will get better. The picture today is not looking very good regarding TDOT’s funding.” Representative Borchardt stated, “I’d like you to explain why SR-1 and SR-54 are under Not to Be Considered”. Teresa Estes replied, “It means we don’t anticipate being able to finish the preliminary engineering in time for next year’s budget”. Representative Borchardt replied, “Well you got Nissan coming to Williamson County, they’re building roads everywhere up there, but our rural roads are getting shut down. I’m ready to vote for raising the gas tax, but not until you start building my roads now. We’ve been left out, if you don’t…I won’t vote for anything any more. I’ve voted for everything TDOT when we’ve been up there- trying to help my rural roads, but all we get is a kick in the butt and that’s not going to work for me”. Del Truitt responded, “ We appreciate your input and I think you’ve been a part of this organization. One of the reasons for these organizations is to bring the local rural officials to the table once and for all because they never had a seat at the table”. Rep. Borchardt replied, “There’s not many of us left because Nashville is getting the roads, Memphis is getting the roads, Jackson’s getting the roads, and we’re sucking air. They’re getting the legislators and they’re out-voting us…if anybody doesn’t believe than go to Nashville and watch”. Del Truitt replied, “Well, the voting is your part”. Rep. Borchardt said, “I know that, but…I want to help TDOT, but I want TDOT to help me. I’m fixing to tell Commissioner Nicely just as much cause I don’t like what’s on this list. I’m going to tell Phillip Pinion too. I’ll say Stewart County’s got roads coming pretty good, but Henry and Benton County’s are sucking air. When you’ve lost 11 plants in your area and the department of economic development is telling you that you aren’t going to get anything until you get your roads fixed; you’re going to hear about me and my roads. If you can’t help me, I can’t help you. I believe in telling it like it is. Thank you”. Randy Lovett asked the attendees “Did anybody have any questions about the overall financial picture? I know it’s a bit sketchy, but that’s what we deal with. You kind of get a bunch of info at one time and then it changes the next day. Ed Cole calls the scenario a perfect storm and I think it’s a pretty good analogy”. Carl Holder asked “What is normally your ratio between state versus federal funds?” Mr. Lovett replied, “Ballpark total funds are almost 50/50. About 700 million in state funds and 900 million in federal funds. The problem is that it’s an apportionment and we have to make sure we have enough state dollars to match those federal dollars. So we go with the apportionment-that’s what you read in the paper. What you don’t read in the paper is that a month later we’ve had rescissions or through obligational authority they’re taking money away from us.” Carl Holder then asked, “If the money to match federal dollars for a project is appropriated and then those federal dollars go away, what happens with those state dollars”. Randy Lovett replied “We’ll put those dollars towards that project or we’ll use them on a state highway”. Macie Roberson asked, “What’s the commissioner going to say to the legislature regarding these funding hardships?” Randy Lovett replied, “The main source of revenue is gas tax, although you may be surprised how much motor vehicle registration funds come to us. When you hear the term Highway User Fee, that’s what we’re talking about. Locals receive about 37% of the gas tax which is split among cities and counties”. Linda Holder asked, “What’s a penny raise in the gas tax worth to you?” Randy Lovett replied, “A penny raise in gas tax is worth about 30million dollars, but not all of that comes to us. We also receive about $21 per motor vehicle registration which comes out to be about $210 million.” Mr. Lovett asked if there were any more questions to which there was no reply. Mr. Lovett than thanked the attendees.

Theresa Estes than provided the executive committee with a description of the projects list to be prioritized. She stated that projects in the A list were ready for next phase funding whereas the B-list projects were still under development in the phase shown. Jim Hayes asked for clarification regarding SR-54 contained in the B list. Mr. Hayes wanted to know “what do the double asterisks mean, and why is it not scheduled for development until 2009?” Chuck Rychen responded that sometimes it’s 3, 4, or 5 years to get an environmental assessment document completed. Mr. Hayes stated that he thought that the environmental documentation had already been completed on the project. Mr. Rychen replied that the environmentals were lengthy due to the fact that they encompassed the entire project “up to the Kentucky state line”. Mr. Rychen continued by saying that he understands the frustration of Henry County and that this project has been funded in the past work plan for ROW in 05 and 06. Mr. Rychen stated that the project has had some stagnation due to funding issues, but that once the environmentals are finished most of the design work is already completed so the project should move ahead fairly quickly. Mr. Rychen said that by 2009 the road should be ready for construction. Teresa Estes reiterated that “because a project isn’t on the A list, doesn’t mean it’s off the table. It’s not on the A list because the current phase is not complete. We can’t appropriate money for the project phase until the current phase is completed.” Carl Holder stated that he didn’t understand the double asterisk. Mrs. Estes explained that this is/was what our legislators voted on and set aside funding for the project. Mrs. Estes further explained that this was based on a projected budget. She continued, “Because we are on a month to month appropriation we’ve got to make management decisions as to whether or not to find money in an ’08 or ’09 project, delay that project, so that we can complete a different project. In the past, some projects have been completely removed from the work program”. Carl Holder asked, “For illustration purposes, when it says P.E. with an asterisk…that means it may not happen?” Teresa Estes replied in the affirmative. Kenny McBride asked about SR76 and SR 218 since it appeared they were in the construction phase. Brad Hurley asked what phase came after construction [tongue in cheek]. Teresa Estes explained that a project that has been programmed for construction, if it comes in under budget, is ready to be let. Mrs. Estes further explained that if the project were to come in over budget then it could not be let for construction. Kenny McBride stated that the right of way had been purchased for SR76. Del Truitt replied that he knew about #2 and that we have to watch those other projects. Kenny McBride said, “So I can tell these people that call about the land they sold for right of way that these projects will be built?” Teresa Estes replied in the affirmative.

Regional and Planning

NWTDD