The Latest News from Your Local Road Engineer
By Norm Bowers
Last summer the Transportation Breakthrough Team of The Kansas Collaborative began to work with the KAC Board, the Kansas County Highway Association and the Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT) to realize a dream that was held by many county engineers and road and bridge people, i.e. to develop a service that provides information not easily available to the counties and looks out for the counties’ interests at the state level. The dream is now a reality. The work of the Local Road Engineer started in late March, 2007 and now is well underway. This service is a pilot project funded for one year by KDOT and the KAC. The service does not offer site specific engineering, but seeks to assists counties through the following seven major areas. Specific services are outlined below:
Area No. 1. Represent the county’s interest with federal and state regulatory agencies: The local road engineer will work with federal and state agencies when new regulations are proposed to see that the counties’ viewpoint and interests are represented.
Area No. 2. Represent the counties with special interest groups like the Kansas Contractors Association, Land Surveyors, and Consulting Engineers to name a few. We have had misunderstandings with these groups in the past, which resulted in legislative proposals that were not favorable to counties. We want to avoid those conflicts in the future if we can, and one point of contact and better communications will help.
Area No. 3. Improve communications between KDOT and the counties. KDOT is in the same business as our road departments, and we generally have similar interests and needs. KDOT is a big organization and any agency in KDOT may at times need to contact a county or counties, or get input from counties, and we hope to be able to facilitate that process.
Area No. 4. Legislative Advocacy In the legislative area credible technical testimony is needed on short notice to counter proposed legislation that is detrimental to counties. Should road related proposals come forward we could better provide information on short notice and coordinate testimony by knowledgeable county officials like your engineers and supervisors.
Area No. 5. Preparing templates for use by the counties. Rather than each county having to figure out how to deal with a new issue, a statewide template can be provided that can be modified for local conditions. So rather than each county trying to independently figure out what to do, we can furnish a model plan with instructions on how to tailor the plan to local conditions. This will not only save you folks a lot of time, but will give you confidence that what you are doing meets regulations as well as not being out of line with what other counties are doing.
Area No. 6. Clearing House or State of the Practice. It is important for each county to know what other counties in the state are doing. This information is helpful to answer inquiries, determine standards of care, planning, and just to keep abreast of current issues and practices. It will take a while to compile information to have a good clearing house, but we will get started and with time this can be a very useful service.
Area No. 7. Compile Road and Bridge Laws and Administrative Regulations. We need to compile all the road and bridge laws and regulations so they are easily found by both experienced and new department directors. It will take a number of years to complete this task, but we will get started this year.
The Collaborative Connection.
The Local Road Engineer is also assisting with two other Collaborative projects, including the Project Notification Sharing, and the Joint Purchasing Project. Norm has fact sheets and FAQ’s on these two projects, and is available to answer any questions you might have on making these projects work for your county. When KDOT receives bids on equipment, Norm will notify the counties with the information.
Having a county presence at the state level is already beginning to pay dividends. For instance, when KDHE proposed changing regulations related to the Clean Water Act, county comments were provided which helped to avoid a new requirement on construction projects for an operation and maintenance plans on roads and bridges, and a Water Pollution Prevention Plan for each project.
Here are three quick points to put a wrap on this article:
- Beginning next month I will be writing an article monthly in the County Comment. It will be under the title “On the Road.” Look for it!
- Feedback will be critical to the success of this program. Please send feedback to me personally or through either Randall Allen at the KAC or Joel Wright at The Kansas Collaborative.
- The last paragraph begins to illustrate the benefits of this position to counties. As mentioned in the first paragraph, this pilot is funded for one year. We intend to demonstrate in the next 12 months why it makes good business sense for counties to fund the Local Road Engineer service long-term.
Norm Bowers