RECOMMEND APPROVAL to the Transportation Agency Board to:

1. Program three years (2017/18/19) Regional Surface Transportation Program fair share funds to the cities and County;
2. Program 10% of Regional Surface Transportation Program funds to the RSTP Reserve;
3. Initiate a call for projects to program competitive RSTP funds; and
4. Program three years (2017/18/19) Transportation Development Act 2% funds for the Fort Ord Regional Trail and Greenway project.

The Surface Transportation Program is a federal program that provides states and local jurisdictions with funding for highway improvements, street rehabilitation and transportation enhancements. The Transportation Agency receives an annual apportionment of Regional Surface Transportation Program funding, passed through the State. Because Monterey County didn’t have an urbanized area with a population of greater than 200,000 in the 1990 census, it qualified for the state exchange Surface Transportation Program, whereby Caltrans keeps the federal Surface Transportation Program apportionments for a region and gives the regional agency an equivalent amount of state cash.

The Transportation Agency distributes Regional Surface Transportation Program funding as fair-share and competitive grant programs and retains 10% as a reserve fund. Reserve funds have been used for Complete Street implementation and yet to be determined urgent projects. Monterey County and the cities receive fair-share Regional Surface Transportation Program grants based on their population and road miles. The total fair share allocation over the next three years was set by the Transportation Agency Board of Directors at $3.6 million. This fair share amount would be distributed to the jurisdictions as follows:

The Transportation Agency distributes part of the Regional Surface Transportation Program funding on a competitive basis to transportation projects based on a variety of criteria, including traffic volume and project deliverability.  With the Transportation Agency now seeking to begin a new grant cycle, this process would involve the release of grant materials by the Transportation Agency, and establishing a subcommittee of Technical Advisory Committee and Bicycle Pedestrian Committee members to review and rank project proposals. The estimated three-year total available for grant funds is $6.95 million (see Attachment 1).

Agency staff is proposing to award the competitive grants in two tiers, based on the availability of funding.  The first tier would be funded with the estimated $6.95 million in RSTP.  The second tier would be funded with any deprogrammed funds from the last competitive grants cycle.

In the 2014 Competitive Grants cycle, the Transportation Agency also included Transportation Development Act 2% funding with the Regional Surface Transportation Program funding to increase the overall amount of competitive funding that was available.  However, this cycle, Agency staff is proposing to limit the competitive pot to Regional Surface Transportation Program funds and program the Transportation Development Act 2% funds to pre-construction activities for the Fort Ord Regional Trail and Greenway to help advance the project and make it a better candidate for State and federal grants.

Transportation Agency staff has updated its policies and procedures related to the Regional Surface Transportation Program (Attachment 2). Transportation Agency staff will provide an update at the Executive Committee meeting on the guidelines, as well as review policies for the distribution of fair share allocations, the timely use of funds, use of interest, project eligibility, and discuss criteria and procedures for future grant cycles. The draft schedule for these activities are included as Attachment 3.