State transportation department fails to explain loss of tens of millions in highway funds
The federal highway department annually marks the end of August with a redistribution of billions in transportation dollars that states haven’t obligated.
It does this through a competitive process in which states must have plans in place to obligate the money for approved projects before the end of the fiscal year September 30.
Alaska came up short in the competition this year, with a $19 million share, down from $108 million last year and $87 million two years ago. The $90 million drop from a year ago means some projects will be delayed or canceled.
Alaska is to receive to lowest amount of the $8.7 billion redistributed to the 50 states.
The Dunleavy administration has declined to answer questions about what road projects will be delayed or cancelled. There has been no news coverage other than here.
In 2022, the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities celebrated the then record haul of $87 million in August redistribution funds with this press release.
“We’re putting this money into our construction programs to make way for new investment,” said Ryan Anderson, DOT&PF Commissioner. “Alaska is geared up to build projects that address safety and fix our existing infrastructure.”
The state said the $87 million would be applied to seven projects.
“August redistribution is a mechanism to redistribute funding authority to states that demonstrated they have met 100 percent of their federal allocation and have further, unfunded, federally eligible transportation needs,” the transportation department said.
“The $87 million redistribution set a record for Alaska, outpacing the previous 2015 record of $76 million. The average redistribution over the past five years is $43.5 million, making this year’s redistribution a 100 percent increase over the five-year average,” the department said two years ago.
The amounts available for redistribution have grown substantially in recent years, rising to about 10 percent of highway funds.
In a legislative presentation in January, Anderson said the 2023 addition of $108 million from August redistribution brought the total amount of federal highway funds successfully obligated to Alaska to $936 million. That was another new record.
“We were very successful in spending money last year and we were rewarded by the federal government with an additional $108 million in transportation funds. So that’s August redistribution we call it and so every year it’s been increasing. It’s really money other states aren’t spending that’s coming to our state.”
“So as long as the rules stay the same we feel like we’re going to be in a good situation to keep doing that in the future,” Anderson told lawmakers on January 25, 2024.
The department’s overall road plan mentions “large August redistributions becoming available year after year. . .”
Not this year, with an unexplained $90 million decrease to $19 million.
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