Project Profile: Yuba County Road Repairs Project Bundling - “Tomorrow’s Paving Today”, California

Yuba County, California

Yuba County

Special Assessment: Sales Tax

Local Road

The Yuba County Maintained Road System consists of over 650 miles of roads. The Maintained Road System also includes 76 bridges greater than 20 feet in length, plus thousands of culverts and drainage structures. The number of road miles grew steadily for several years with new housing developments. Between 2012 and 2016, the County performed very limited maintenance on County roads because of the  limited budget. Of the County’s over 650 miles of roads, only approximately 172 miles (26 percent) meet qualifications for Federal or State Aid funds. The remaining 480-plus miles are urban or rural local roads, which do not qualify for these funds.

To help complete 70 miles of road repairs in one summer, Yuba County worked with the Yuba Water Agency to secure advanced funding for future gas tax funds. The project had originally been scheduled for just 15 miles of road repairs, but bundling all roadwork into two large contracts helped the county save around $4 million. This helped to avoid escalating construction costs and ongoing maintenance on roads in need of long-term solutions.

The California legislature passed SB 848 in June 2018, which explicitly allows local agencies to borrow against future Road Maintenance and Rehabilitation Account apportionments to advance fund work. In addition, State legislature passed a comprehensive transportation funding bill in 2017 to establish a reliable source of gas tax revenues (about $3 million per year) for the foreseeable future. It adjusted for inflation, but would still have taken years to make significant progress in fixing roads. Yuba County worked with State lawmakers and received a $9 million loan at 2.25 percent. The county plans to use its general fund to pay off interest on the advanced funding.

Deemed “Tomorrow’s Paving Today,” the project won an award for efficiency and sustainability through the 2020 Outstanding Local Streets and Roads Project Awards Program. The program was developed to recognize and raise awareness of the exceptional achievements made by California’s cities and counties to preserve and protect the public’s investment in the local street and road system.

$12 million

Yuba Water Agency – Lease-leaseback
Annual gas tax revenues

Project Bundling Contract

Yuba Water Agency, via Lease-Leaseback Structure

Hills contract – All-American Construction
Valley contract – Teichert Construction

Yuba Water Agency

The Hills Contract construction, completed by All-American Construction, took place between June 2019 and September 2019. The Valley Contract construction, completed by Teichert Construction, took place between July 2019 and December 2019.

The Yuba Water Agency is advancing $9 million to the county in order to obtain the discounts and realize the cost savings. In return, the Yuba Water Agency will receive a guaranteed return on the loan at a slightly higher rate than is expected from leaving its money in the county treasury. The remaining $3 million was derived from the annual gas tax.

• Use EDC-5 Project Bundling contract to fix four years of road repairs in one summer
• Innovative finance structure Lease-Lease back to advance the 70 miles of road repairs
• By completing many years’ worth of construction in a few months, Yuba County was able to save $4 million by:
• Achieving discounts by doing a few large contracts versus many smaller contracts
• Avoiding inflation and escalating construction costs
• Avoiding ongoing maintenance costs that would have been necessary on the improved roads over the coming years

• Yuba.com – Yuba County Gets Statewide Award After Fixing Four Years' Worth Of Roads In One Summer
• YubaNet.com – Water Agency deal means 60-plus miles of Yuba County road repairs
• ABC10 – How Yuba County is completing four years of road repairs by the end of summer