Guiding principles to select projects for funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
Adopted by the Transportation Advisory Board on Feb. 18, 2009
The Metropolitan Council and Transportation Advisory Board will allocate a portion of federal transportation dollars from the Recovery and Reinvestment Act, including about $69 million for metro-area transit projects and about $73 million for metro-area road and highway projects. These projects will be selected using the following guidelines to ensure the timely selection of projects that are consistent with regional needs and priorities, with the heaviest emphasis on the first three guiding principles.
1. The overriding objective of project advancement must be job creation to help bring the country out of recession.
2. Project “readiness” for authorization, or to let a contract, is the No. 1 criteria for project selection to help to meet the objectives of the Recovery Act. Project “deliverability” is also very important.
3. The economic development impact of projects beyond the initial job creation should be considered in selecting projects. Economic development, in this case, includes additional investments in residential, office, retail or manufacturing brought about by improved accessibility or mobility resulting from a project.
4. The project must be of value to the region or state.
5. Projects currently identified the regional or state Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) should be eligible for funding under the Reinvestment and Recovery Act, as those projects generally have had project development work completed and are priorities that have already been agreed upon.
6. If projects in the regional or state TIP are selected for stimulus funding, backfill projects should be identified.
7. Selecting projects for stimulus funding that can be authorized or have contracts let over the entire eligibility period will spread out the demand for labor, equipment and capital resources over time and will be helpful in keeping down material and labor costs.
8. Funding priority should be given to projects that adhere to adopted regional and state policies.
9. Assuming the allocation of funds to the state will have to be authorized on a set schedule, advancing some major, regionally significant projects may be more achievable than advancing a large number of small projects. The low-cost, high-benefit projects in the 2030 Transportation Policy Plan should be considered for funding if the decision is made to proceed with smaller projects.
10. If a large project is selected, consideration should be given to backfilling the TIP with a variety of project types and sizes.
11. 100% federal funding is assumed for all projects selected for stimulus funding, and should apply to the state and local share of the total project. State bonding may have to be pursued for non-eligible project-related costs.
12. The project selection process should be transparent and open. No projects should be automatically in or out of consideration.
13. Project selection should consider geographic equity.
14. Given there will be a split of funds between the Metro District and Greater Minnesota, consideration should be given to projects that might benefit both sufficiently to share the “costs.”