Amador County – A tri-county agreement that has brought $100 million in highway project money to Amador, Alpine and Calaveras Counties ended Wednesday when the Amador County Transportation Commission voted unanimously to pull out of negotiations for a new Tri-county Memorandum of Understanding, to pursue funding on its own.

Commissioners approved applying for separate funding that had been pooled between the counties since signing an MOU 10 years ago to share funding for projects from the State Transportation Improvement Program. Negotiations of an “MOU 2” led to frustrations for Supervisor Chairman John Plasse and Supervisor Richard Forster, who negotiated on behalf of ACTC for about 5 hours over two meetings. Plasse and Forster recommended ending the MOU 2 talks, and ACTC Executive Director Charles Field agreed.

Field said ACTC will apply for Transportation Enhancement funds of $445,000 for the Kennedy Mine Tailing Wheel access enhancement project, and by April 2012 may have the environmental clearance to apply for $3.3 million for Plans, Specifications and Estimates for the Highway 88 Pine Grove Corridor Improvement project.

He recommended ending the MOU 2 but said transportation officials in both Alpine and Calaveras county felt “no ill will” about the separation. He said the recommendation was based on diminishing funding availability, due to the economy, and a failure to get a fair offer from Calaveras County, which was “adamant that a phase of their project (the Wagon Trail) should go to construction first, and that the right-of-way for this entire $60 million to $80 million highway project should be made shelf-ready for construction with Caltrans Interregional funds or other outside funding.” Field said this came even as ACTC limited itself in its Pine Grove Corridor project to $30 million to $40 million.

Commissioner Plasse said “after five hours of meetings and proposals and counter-proposals, the way our partners wanted to go about it was far more beneficial to Calaveras County.” He said they benefit from ACTC staff expertise and relationships, with much more benefit to them than to Amador County, and “if this is a courtship then the wedding is doomed.”

Commission Keith Sweet asked if there was no chance for a future partnership. Plasse said: “I’d say that opportunity exists always.” Forster said the opportunity to make MOU 2 work was there for the last two-and-a-half weeks, since the last conference call, and “I’m going to separate with no ill will.”

The commission voted 5-0 to advise Alpine and Calaveras counties, Caltrans and the California Transportation Commission that “Amador will no longer participate in the Tri-County MOU 2 concerning use of current and future STIP funding,” and authorized staff to prepare applications for the funding, which are due Dec. 15. The commission also moved up its next regular meeting by a week to Dec. 14.

Story by Jim Reece This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.