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County Counting On Cash That Might Not Come

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By KEVIN WIATROWSKI, The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 14, 2007

DADE CITY - State budget cuts could cost Pasco County millions of dollars in road funding, county officials learned Thursday.

Gov. Charlie Crist has asked the state Department of Transportation to cut $225 million from its budget, the bulk of that from grant programs Pasco officials have come to rely on for road projects, Bob Clifford, head of planning for DOT's Tampa office, told county transportation planners.

The Transportation Regional Incentive Program doles out state money on a competitive basis for regional road networks. Pasco stands to get $54.6 million from the program by 2011.

The county is slated to get an additional $4.7 million from the County Incentive Grant Program.

That's nearly $60 million the county hopes to use for buying right of way on State Road 52 and State Road 54 to widen U.S. 41 north of Connerton and rebuild the bridge carrying Interstate 75 over County Road 54 (Wesley Chapel Boulevard) in Wesley Chapel.

State law says the grant money can't be spent until the Legislature allocates it each year, so cutbacks could bite into Pasco's future road money, said Doug Uden, director of the county's Metropolitan Planning Organization. The MPO plans transportation projects across the county.

Uden said later that, to his knowledge, no Pasco projects were on the chopping block.

County road planners have come to rely on the state grants for projects because the process is simpler than trying to land state or federal earmarks, Uden said.

County officials plan to ask Crist and local legislators to reconsider the grant cuts.

Reporter Kevin Wiatrowski can be reached at kwiatrowski@tampatrib.com or (813) 948-4201.

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