State Auditor Dave Vaudt is recommending the Department of Transportation do a better job of checking up on the use of money for a program that awards grants for projects like bike paths and trails. The audit reviewed what’s called the Transportation Enhancement Program.
Vaudt says they found there is some additional work that needs to be done by the D.O.T. to verify that the local match from communities is actually coming through and doing site monitoring during the construction of the projects while they are being built. The review covered the period from July of 2007 through June of 2009. Vaudt says there needs to be better oversight of the matching funds provided by local governments.
He says some of the matches were not well documented how the local governments came up with the money. Vaudt says the programs require 20% to 30% local matches and there are some restrictions on where the money can come from. Vaudt says the overall use of the money appeared to be okay.
Vaudt says they did not find any problems with the types of projects being constructed, as they all seemed to follow the federal guidelines. The program received nearly 44-million dollars in federal funds during the state fiscal years 2005 through
2009 for what are called nontraditional transportation related projects.