The state Department of Transportation has pursued the widening of the thin, 22-mile stretch for more than a year, but recent fatalities spurred the state to fast track permitting and designs to get the project under way as early as February. Thirty-three people have died on the highway since 1997.
The Beaufort County Transportation Advisory Group, a multi-jurisdictional group that comments on regional transportation issues, will hear a presentation from the Transportation Department on Tuesday regarding the funding plan.
Beaufort County last year committed $2 million to the project through developer fees, but the $150 million price tag likely will have to include a more substantial buy-in from local governments, Keith Bishop, finance director for the Transportation Department, said Thursday.
The funding plan includes an application from the two counties for a $90 million grant from the State Infrastructure Bank, along with $48 million in bonds through the bank that would have to be reimbursed.
As a local contribution, the two counties and the regional agency would be expected to contribute a total of $1.3 million a year toward the bond with the Transportation Department contributing $3 million a year.
All contributions are contingent on approval from the local groups, Bishop said, and it has not been determined how they would be broken up among the trio. Infrastructure Bank applications typically include a local match of about 35 to 40 percent, he said. The $105 million widening of S.C. 170 was paid for primarily through the Infrastructure Bank and included a $30 million investment raised through a 1 percent capital project sales tax approved by voters.
Beaufort has a history of acknowledging that full funding for road projects doesn't come from Columbia, County Council Chairman Weston Newton said Thursday, but the county doesn't have the money to invest in the project.
"Absent an alternative revenue source, it's a commitment to increase property taxes," Newton said.
The county has presented two unsuccessful capital project sales tax referendums to voters since 2002, both with money for U.S. 17 improvements, and Newton said another referendum is expected in November 2006.
The Transportation Department is open to in-kind contributions, Bishop said, including donations of locally owned right of way or commitments for future maintenance of the highway.
"I don't think we've taken anything off the table," he said.
Other funding in place for the project includes:
The Transportation Department had previously suggested the cost for the widening could reach $200 million, but Bishop said he was comfortable working with a $150 million budget.