With legislation finally settled, we are now able to disclose our plans for the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act commonly known as the “Economic Stimulus Program”. This program was signed into law by President Obama on February 17, 2009, with the Governor of Michigan signing a companion law in April, 2009. These laws authorized a significant amount of road funds to be spent on “shovel ready” construction projects; unfortunately, both laws included a considerable amount of “red tape.” It has required a great deal of staff time to interpret the complex details of this program.
The Road Commission anticipates $3,500,000 in new federal funding over the next two years. This is a welcomed short term influx of much needed investment in our paved road system. We anticipate that most of this new revenue will be utilized to fund preventative maintenance on our paved roads during 2009 and 2010, since these types of projects can be implemented quickly.
This year we are planning to perform preventative maintenance on close to 90 miles of our federal aid paved roads. In addition, there will be close to 10 miles of major resurfacing and/or reconstruction in conjunction with our Capital Improvement Program through the standard federal aid programs. When you add this new money to our planned programs, we should have another good year of robust investments in our paved road system.
Map of Washtenaw County Stimulus Projects (This is a large file and may take time to download)