Counties chart new transportation spending with gas tax money

DES MOINES - Local governments across the state are deciding how to spend the newfound revenue for roads and bridges created by a recent increase of the state's gas tax.

Cities and counties will receive more than $100 million each year as a result of the 10-cent-per-gallon state gas tax increase that went into effect March 1, according to state estimates.

Earlier this week, the state set its plan for how to spend those new revenues.

Local governments across Iowa are making the same considerations.

'It sort of gives us flexibility in the whole (transportation) system to do those critical things,” Scott County engineer Jon Burgstrum said Friday in downtown Des Moines at a meeting of the Iowa Department of Transportation's Secondary Road Fund Distribution Committee. 'And that's really what this is for: the critical needs and new construction kind of tied together.

'So we have roads that are approaching the end of their line, thin-layer asphalt roads that need some attention. That's where some of the money's going to go. And then some of these smaller bridges that have been kind of sitting out there for a while, we need to move them forward.”

Roughly half of the revenue produced by the state gas tax goes to the state. The other half goes to cities and counties, which will receive roughly an additional $100 million annually as a result of the recent gas tax increase.

The state adjusted its transportation spending plan this week to account for the new gas tax revenue, moving up some big projects, including the four-lane expansion of U.S. 20 in northwest Iowa.

Cities and counties will make spending decisions on local roads and bridges, addressing repair and construction needs that were foremost in the debate over whether to raise the state gas tax.

'Certainly, the local revenue will go to the existing system, plus a good share of the state money as well,” said Stuart Anderson of the Iowa DOT. 'The bridge issue is really a county system issue. They have 20,000 of the 25,000 bridges and the great majority of the structurally deficient bridges. So we'll certainly see investment in bridges on the county system.”

Burgstrum said the new revenue already is helping to advance the timeline on projects in Scott County, including road paving near Lost Grove Lake.

'The projects that are eligible to use this new money on are in our program already,” Burgstrum said. 'It's not like that they weren't going to get done. It's just when.”