Fact Sheet on FY'01 ITS Deployment Program

In Fiscal Year 2001, the Congress designated 92 projects in 41 states and the District of Columbia that will receive funding under this program. Attached is a list of all areas and actual amounts of funding available for each area. These amounts are less than the Congressionally designated amounts due to the obligation limitation and other factors explained below.

While the FY 2001 Appropriations Act specifies the locations and amounts of funding, it does not designate specific projects to be funded. We are currently developing instructions to Congressionally Designated Areas which explain the process that has been established for approving projects and obligating the funds. Those instructions will be made available by the end of November 2000 through the field offices of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), the Federal Transit Administration (FTA), and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA).These instructions will call for the development and submittal of a project proposal in accordance with guidelines and formats provided in the instructions. The intent of these proposals is to demonstrate compliance with all the requirements of TEA-21 for use of these funds.

Congressionally Designated Amounts versus Amounts Authorized

FY 2001 Congressional designations against the ITS Deployment Program total $127.8 million; $9.8 million in TEA-21, and $118 million in the FY 2001 DOT Appropriation Bill (see column 3 of the attached worksheet). However, TEA-21 only authorizes $118 million for the ITS Deployment Program in FY 2001. Thus the $127.8 million in Congressionally designated projects exceeds the FY 2001 available amount of $118 million by $9.8 million. To adjust the Congressionally designated amounts downward to the authorized level, each Congressionally designated project was necessarily reduced by approximately 7.67%.

Reductions Required by Section 1102(f) of TEA-21

The ITS Program is not only subject to the overall obligation limitation on Federal-aid Highways but is also subject to proportional distribution of that limitation. In FY 2001, each State and/or program subject to the distribution of the FY 2001 Obligation Limitation receives an obligation limitation equal to 87.9% of the amounts "authorized" for FY 2001.

Basically, Section 1102(f) states that any amounts for "allocated" programs which cannot be obligated within the distributed obligation limitation will be deducted from these programs and redistributed to the States. Implementation of this section will reduce the ITS Deployment Program from $118 million to $103.722 million, a reduction of 12.1%. This mandated 12.1% reduction ($14.278 million) has been applied proportionately to each Congressionally designated project.

Reductions for Project Evaluations

Section 5204(j) requires the Secretary to issue guidelines and requirements to ensure that independent evaluations will be made on ITS operational tests and deployment projects. This section also directs the establishment of evaluation funding to ensure adequate evaluations are carried out.

For FY 2001 all ITS Deployment Program funding recipients will be required to conduct an evaluation that is locally funded and executed. Cross-cutting assessments of these local evaluations will be conducted by the ITS Joint Program Office and will include gathering data and disseminating results.

In-depth, independent evaluations of selected projects of national significance (as determined by the ITS Joint Program Office), will also be required. Funding for the evaluations of significant projects will be derived by pooling 2% of each project amount.