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Budget, ITIP, Highway Safety, legislative ideas highlight
upcoming June board meeting

Review of the draft budget request and Idaho Transportation Investment Program, adoption of next year’s highway safety plan, and discussion of possible legislation will highlight the monthly meeting of the Idaho Transportation Board June 20-22 in Boise at the ITD District 3 Office, 8150 Chinden Boulevard.

Workshop
The board will start its June meeting with a workshop Tuesday afternoon, June 20, in District 3.

Staff will present the draft FY19 budget request of $664.9 million with 1,648 full-time positions. Some of the appropriation requests include $28.5 million for replacement items, such as computer equipment, lab and engineering equipment, and road equipment; about $460 million for construction; $500,000 for highway safety activities like the Alive at 25 Program; almost $3 million to rebuild or construct a new District 4 headquarters building; and $450,000 to increase funding for the Idaho Airport Aid Program.

The draft FY18-24 Idaho Transportation Investment Program (ITIP) will also be reviewed. It includes highway, transit, and aeronautics projects. With board concurrence, the draft ITIP will then be made available for public review and comment.

Tour
The board will tour District 3 on Wednesday, June 21.

The tour will focus on Interstate 84 in Ada and Canyon counties. After a stop in Nampa to tour the Amalgamated Sugar Factory, the board will travel U.S. 95 to Council to view the recently completed alternate route.

Highway Safety Plan
At its business meeting on June 22 in the District 3 Office, the board will be asked to approve the FY18 Highway Safety Plan.

The document, required by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, was developed to reduce traffic crashes, deaths, and injuries. The plan’s primary goal is to reduce the 5-year average number of traffic deaths to 185 or fewer by 2020. In 2016, there were 252 fatalities.

The plan focuses on 11 areas: aggressive driving, distracted driving, impaired drivers, occupant protections, commercial motor vehicles, intersections, lane departures, bicycle and pedestrians, mature drivers, motorcycles, and youthful drivers.

Specific projects in the plan are high-visibility enforcement campaigns for impaired driving, underage drinking enforcement, funding for police departments’ special enforcement unit, bicycle and pedestrian education and training, the annual Highway Safety Summit, and paid media campaigns.

Enterprise Risk Management
Staff will introduce the Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) program, outlining the principles and proposed approach, the roles of various stakeholders, and the proposed timeline for implementation.

ERM is a department-wide process that looks at potential future events where the outcome might not be known, and tries to anticipate and respond to uncertainties and risks.

Legislative ideas
Staff will present one proposed legislative idea for the 2018 session: the allowance of electronic credentials for commercial motor vehicle permits. It will also ask board members if they have any legislative ideas they would like staff to pursue.

Currently, overlegal permits must be in writing and carried in the vehicle, so law enforcement or an authorized agent can review them upon request. Proposed legislation would allow the permit in electronic form. This efficiency would reduce the costs of producing hard copies, although the applicant would still have the option of receiving a hard copy. It is hard to estimate how much money could be saved, but it could easily be $10,000 annually. The electronic option would also reduce staff’s time to reprint and mail lost or damaged overlegal permits.