Paving plans hit speed bump: More money than manpower
Rome and Floyd County have a new funding source for road paving projects in 2024, but there may be more money than manpower. Gov. Brian Kemp and the Legislature included $250 million in Local Road Assistance Administration funds in the amended fiscal year 2024 budget.
Rome Public Works Director Chris Jenkins recently told the Rome-floyd Transportation Policy Committee that the city is getting $647,000 in LRA funds from the state.
“It’s the same as the LMIG process for a grant,” he said. “Except the requirement as far as a match is zero. It will be paid 100%, so it’s actually more money than we are getting with our LMIG grant.”
LMIG is the Local Maintenance and Improvement Grant, which is available from the state each year. The city is getting $523,000 for 2024. It costs about $100,000 a mile to pave, so the combined LRA and LMIG funding would total close to 12 miles.
Floyd County is getting $1.6 million in LRA funds in addition to $1.3 million in LMIG funding, which would be about 30 miles of paving in 2024. There is also around $110 million in special purpose, local option sales tax funds for road projects in the city and county. According to Floyd County Manager Jamie Mccord, that is more paving than the county can do in one year.
“We probably have more dollars to pave than we have people to pave — just keep that in mind,” he said. “I don’t want expectations that we can do 50 miles this year. We can’t do 50 miles.”
Mccord noted that there are 20 vacancies at public works, and outsourcing the work would double the cost. Also on Wednesday, the Rome-floyd Metropolitan Planning Organization Coordinating Committee approved a resolution that could pave the way for grant funding for an update to the Metropolitan Transportation Plan.
The long range plan is updated every five years, according to City of Rome Transportation Planner Julie Smith. “We are using base year 2020 census and socio-economic data, and we are looking out to the year 2055,” she said. “MPO would hire a consultant for this, and I am asking for $200,000 from GAMPO, which is the Georgia Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations. It’s an 80-20 match, so $160,000 from federal and then a 20% match, split between the city and county.”
The MTP outlines the goals, objectives, policies, and proposed improvements needed to maintain a safe, effective, and efficient multimodal transportation system for the movement of people and goods throughout the region which includes all of the City of Rome, the City of Cave Spring, and Floyd County.