The Senate has approved a new requirement in the process for counties identifying priority MDOT projects – support of the county’s legislative delegation.

In the Senate amendments to the broad Budget Reconciliation and Financing Act, HB 1407, new language was added  and approved by the Senate to change the requirements for identifying a local priority project. Under the proposed language, when a county submits a “local priority letter” to the Department of Transportation, identifying a project as a local priority, a majority of the county’s legislative delegations (both House and Senate) must support the project.

From the text of the amendment:

The bill (as well as the budget itself) will now head to a conference committee, where the many House/Senate differences would need to be resolved. The House did not adopt any similar language in its version of the BRFA.