Citizens’ Transportation Advisory Board (CTAB) – Reports and Project Recommendations
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mowen@spokanecity.org

TBD Program

This information has been compiled to summarize the Citizens’ Transportation Advisory Board’s (CTAB) recommendations for expenditure of your $20.00 TBD vehicle tab fee: The CTAB welcomes you to view the board’s full report and recommendations - CTAB Annual Report and TBD Program Recommendations and 2012 TBD Sidewalk Program.

2011 marks the first year of the City’s 6-yr TBD Program: The TBD program started collecting funds in September 2011. The TBD Board created a Citizens’ Transportation Advisory Board, an all-volunteer oversight board, to provide accountability and transparency regarding the expenditure of TBD funds. The CTAB began meeting in mid-September 2011 and brought their first annual report and TBD program recommendations to the TBD Board on December 19th, 2011. The CTAB’s 2012 TBD Project Recommendations were accepted on the 19th by the TBD Board (6 to 1 vote) and again by the City Council during their regular Council meeting.

CTAB Annual Report and TBD Program

2012 TBD Program includes both arterial and residential road maintenance and repair projects. More specifically the 2012 TBD Program includes:

• 5 Arterial Grind and Overlay Projects;
• 3 Residential Grind and overlay projects (one per council district);
• 3 Residential Chip Seal projects (one per council district);
• Residential Crack Seal Program - approximately 300k linear feet sealed; and,
• Recommendations for implementing the Pedestrian Program of the TBD

There are many benefits of the 2012 TBD Program. Some of the program highlights include:

• Reduction in the streets maintenance backlog by funding eight grind and overlay projects throughout the City;
• Moving the City toward a ’best pavement management practice’ by instituting both a residential chip seal program and a residential crack seal program to preserve and ’prolong the life’ of existing streets; and
• Setting aside 10% of TBD revenue for future pedestrian improvement.

In selecting TBD funded projects the CTAB expressed various street maintenance and repair priorities. Some of these priorities included;

• Fund maintenance of newer streets now to protect citizen investment in the City’s street infrastructure by ensuring that streets in good condition will need less costly repairs in future years and last as long as possible;
• Provide needed maintenance of arterial and residential streets which would not be possible without the TBD revenue ’ and
• Recommend maintenance techniques that are cost effective.
• Recommend implementation of the pedestrian portion of the TBD funds.

The CTAB also considered the location of the Street Department’s maintenance projects already scheduled for 2012 as well as bond projects scheduled to be constructed in 2012. Proposed Phase 2 Street Bond project locations were also taken into account when selecting the projects for 2012.

Finally, the CTAB felt very strongly that TBD revenues need to enhance the City Street Department’s current funding levels. Revenue from the TBD vehicle tab fee should not be supplanted (used to fill budget gaps) instead of serving as intended, namely for additional dollars in excess of the Street Department general fund budget.

Looking into the future, CTAB members have expressed their support for efforts to maintain recent bond projects through support of a new 10-year street bond that includes dedicated funding for bond project maintenance and repair or through the use of TBD funds when other funding sources are not available.

The CTAB looks forward to keeping you informed about the progress made to street repair and maintenance because of the $20 vehicle tab fee we are investing into our street network.

The CTAB wants to hear from you

If you would like to provide feedback on the current year TBD program recommendations or offer suggestion and comments regarding how you would like to see your vehicle tab fee be put to use, please feel free to email us at mowen@spokanecity.org. Your comments, questions and suggestions will be considered as we formulate future year TBD program recommendations.