Federal funding for Oahu transportation projects could be slashed by about $12 million annually unless the state and city make a slew of changes to the group tasked with prioritizing the island’s major road projects.
Key local transportation officials said they expect be able to make the required changes within the deadlines outlined in a 44-page final draft report that the Federal Transit Administration and Federal Highway Administration issued to the Oahu Metropolitan Planning Organization on Friday. But Honolulu City Councilwoman Kymberly Pine said she’s troubled because federal officials have been asking for the same changes for years without much success.
The $12 million figure represents 20 percent of all federal funds channeled through OMPO.
OMPO prioritizes, plans and coordinates most major road projects on the island, particularly those that are federally funded. The federal government requires all urbanized areas with a population of 50,000 or more to have such an agency if it wants to receive federal transportation dollars.
The final draft report concludes that OMPO is out of step with many of the requirements set at the federal level in recent years, said Brian Gibson, OMPO executive director.
"There’s a pretty wide gap between what the feds are expecting and the way things are actually getting done."
One fundamental change the agencies want is for the Legislature to amend the law to say explicitly that OMPO is a decision-making panel like other metropolitan planning areas, Gibson said. State law currently says it is merely advisory.
Many of the other issues deal with a lack of written criteria. For instance, OMPO "lacks adequate documentation of the procedures used to develop, amend or modify key metropolitan planning products," the final draft report’s executive summary states. Even OMPO’s policy, executive and technical advisory committees "do not have defined or documented governance," the final draft report says.
"These aren’t superficial changes," Gibson said. "They go to the core of how we do business, of how we operate."
The report lists three "tiers" of corrective actions that need to be made. Some need to be made within 10 months; others, within four years.
City Transportation Services Director Mike Formby said he views the corrective actions sought as necessary and that it is appropriate for OMPO to come into full compliance.
"For quite a while this MPO was allowed to do things differently than other MPOs," Formby said.
State Sen. Will Espero (D, Ewa Beach-Iroquois Point), OMPO chairman, said he’s confident the changes will be made in time to avoid any reduction in funding.
"We have ample time to take care of the issues and concerns," Espero said. "It’s nothing we cannot do."
But Pine, an OMPO member, said state lawmakers could have made changes to the law in the past and have failed to do so. Pine said she doesn’t like the idea that the city may be punished for lack of action by state lawmakers who’ve already failed to adopt the same proposed changes in the past.
"There are consequences for the city if the state guys don’t change the law," she said. "I feel there’s something seriously wrong with that."
Pine said the loss of $12 million would be severe for the city, while "it’s just a drop in the bucket" for the state, which receives federal funding elsewhere.
Officials with the state Department of Transportation did not respond to a call for comment.
