Southwest of Othello lies McKinney Road, a minor collector road connecting State Route 26 to the fertile surrounding farmland of Adams County. The road is encompassed by irrigated fields, commercial aggregate suppliers and residential homes. McKinney Road serves several vital roles as a haul route to move products to storage and markets, aggregate to project sites and for residential traffic.
THE PROJECT
39% of the average daily traffic on McKinney Road is heavy truck traffic and the road was showing the strain; the 11-foot driving lanes had large areas of pavement distress and the minimal shoulders of gravel and native material were eroding.
To rehabilitate the road, a two-mile stretch of the existing pavement would need to be ground down, the shoulders widened with existing base material to mitigate roadside hazards, drainage facilities replaced where needed, and the side slopes would need to be modified.
THE CHALLENGE
As a 2R rehabilitation project, it was straightforward. However, the biggest challenge to a project is often what happens away from the job site: funding, scheduling, and paperwork.
The McKinney Road project was submitted to CRAB’s Rural Arterial Program (RAP) in 2018 and partially funded for the ’19-21 biennium, enough to begin the typically quick and uncomplicated design phase. The Rural Arterial Trust Account (RATA) funding was increased for the ’21-23 biennium, although not to the full amount requested, and the full RATA accrual was provided by the ’23-’25 biennium budget.
In practice, all of that meant that, although Adams County submitted the project application for the much-needed rehabilitation in 2018, it would have to wait until at least 2023 to begin construction and likely at a higher cost to the county.
THE SOLUTION
In 2021, the staff at the County Road Administration Board recognized that the RATA account balance was staying stubbornly high and began exploring options to address it. They identified active projects, like McKinney Road, that counties were ready to begin but were on hold and waiting because of RATA funding accrual timelines.
CRAB approved a contract amendment to allow Adams County to “borrow forward” the RATA funds already designated for the project but not yet authorized for reimbursement so that they could begin construction immediately instead of waiting for the funds.
According to County Engineer Scott Yaeger, the county had to be strategic with reprioritizing their scheduling and increasing their workload to deliver the project early while keeping their other projects on track. The result of their efforts was a 30-foot-wide road with cement treated base and HMA surfacing delivered two years ahead of schedule in 2022 and ready to safely serve area residents and support the large vehicles of the surrounding businesses. And with the ever-increasing costs of materials and labor, the county was able to realize an estimated $150,000 savings on the project as well.
McKinney Road During Construction
During Paving
McKinney Road After Construction
Fast forward to today and the RATA balance continues to remain higher than ideal. CRAB will continue to encourage other counties to borrow forward from future biennium budgets for active projects if the fund accrual is the only impediment for moving forward and the RATA balance can sustain it.
In fact, we are in the process of drafting up a WAC change to codify this win-win borrow forward solution along with several other innovative changes, so be on the lookout for WAC change proposals coming out soon!
Total Project Cost: $1.55 million
RAP Contribution: $1.07 million
Local Contribution: $484,000
Steve Johnson
Grants Program Manager