Cook County Highway Engineer David Betts came before the Cook County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday, November 15 with a prioritized road and bridge project list that will be submitted to the Minnesota Department of Revenue.
The list provides $162 million in work that must be prioritized because these projects will use money generated from the Greater Minnesota Transportation Sales and Use Tax that was approved by the county board at its September 27 meeting.
Coming to the forefront were two roads—the Pike Lake Road and the Mineral Center Road—that the public expressed keen interest in seeing fixed first.
Last June commissioners discussed establishing a transportation tax at their workshop that would generate about three-quarters of a million dollars per year for the county.
Minnesota Statute 297A.993 allows county boards to enact a transportation sales tax at a rate of up to one-half of one percent on retail sales and uses, and also establish an excise tax of $20 per motor vehicle purchased or acquired from any person engaged in the business of selling motor vehicles at retail.
A collection of the tax must be dedicated exclusively to the payment of the capital costs of specified projects or improvements; payment of the costs, which may include both capital and operating costs, of a particular transit project or development; and payment of the capital costs of safe routes to school program.
At the county board’s July 26 meeting Cook County Administrator Jeff Cadwell said a list of projects would need to be assembled and once the work was done, the tax would end. Typically, he said, that would take about 20 years; however, he added the county board had the authority to terminate the tax any time it chooses to do so.
On October 6, October 20 and November 3 the Highway Committee met to discuss and prioritize the list that Betts presented to the county board. Beyond the top two roads, priorities included already-programmed federal and state aid projects, as well as projects the committee believed would be most beneficial and needed to be done soonest.
“Our plan is to target a combination of smaller and larger projects based on committee and (county) board input, engineering timelines and funding availability,” Betts said.
The county board unanimously passed Bett’s plan.
“The yeoman’s work starts down the line,” said Betts.
“My intention is to stretch these dollars as far as we can. I will look for alternative funds we can go after,” said Betts, “So that as many projects can get done as possible.”
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