BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    




                   Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
                           Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair

                                           2098 (Miller)
          
          Hearing Date:  08/30/2010           Amended: 08/20/2010
          Consultant: Mark McKenzie       Policy Vote: T&H 9-0
          _________________________________________________________________ 
          ____
          BILL SUMMARY:  AB 2098, an urgency measure, would authorize the  
          Riverside County Transportation Commission (RCTC) to use the  
          design-build procurement method for the State Highway Route (SR)  
          91 Corridor Improvement Project, and require the Department of  
          Transportation (Caltrans) to be the agency responsible for  
          construction inspection services.  The bill would also require  
          Caltrans to ensure that public safety and convenience is  
          maintained whenever work is performed under an encroachment  
          permit within the state highway right-of-way, as specified.  The  
          bill would require Caltrans' capital outlay program in the  
          annual Budget Act to include any resources necessary for the  
          performance of workload related to this bill.  The bill would  
          also require RCTC to submit an annual report to the Legislature  
          on the progress of the SR 91 project, beginning two years after  
          a design-build contract is awarded.
          _________________________________________________________________ 
          ____
                            Fiscal Impact (in thousands)

           Major Provisions         2010-11      2011-12       2012-13     Fund
          Design-build authority unknown project costs or savings  
          Special*/
                                                                         
          Federal/Local

          Caltrans staff         unknown significant costs        Special*
          ____________
          * State Highway Account
          _________________________________________________________________ 
          ____

          STAFF COMMENTS: This bill meets the criteria for referral to the  
          Suspense File.
          
          Existing law, pursuant to SBx2 4 (Cogdill), Chapter 2 of 2009,  
          authorizes Caltrans to use the design-build procurement method  
          for 10 state highway, bridge, or tunnel projects, and authorizes  










          a local transportation entity to use design-build for up to five  
          local street or road, bridge, tunnel, or public transit  
          projects, with the approval of the California Transportation  
          Commission (CTC).

          AB 2098 would authorize RCTC to use design-build for the SR 91  
          Corridor Improvement Project, a $1.2 billion project that would  
          extend two tolled express lanes eight miles from the  
          Orange/Riverside county line to SR 15 in Riverside County,  
          reconstruct six interchanges with major arterial roads in the  
          City of Corona, a system of roads that run parallel to the  
          freeway lanes to facilitate vehicles merging on and off the  
          freeway, improvements to SR 15 between the Ontario Avenue  
          interchange and SR 91, and direct connectors from SR 91 to  
          southbound SR 15.  SB 1316 (Correa), Chapter 714 of 2008,  
          authorized RCTC to develop this project and to use issue bonds  
          to finance the costs of the project, and specified that the  
          bonds are payable from toll revenues, sales tax revenues,  
          development impact fees, state and federal grant funds, and any 

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          AB 2098 (Miller)

          other source of revenues available to RCTC that may be used for  
          these purposes.  After bonds are paid off, the facility would  
          revert to Caltrans.

          The design-build procurement method is an alternative method for  
          procuring design and construction services for the delivery of  
          public works projects from a single entity.  This procurement  
          method is designed to save time in the delivery of projects, but  
          may result in increased costs or savings because it has not been  
          evaluated for purposes of state-highway project use and it  
          requires a substantially higher level of project management.

          This bill would require Caltrans staff (or those contracted by  
          Caltrans) to perform all construction inspection services, as  
          specified, as well as ensuring all safety and convenience is  
          maintained in the state rights-of-way.  All Caltrans costs  
          related to this bill are to be included in the annual Caltrans  
          capital outlay program in the Budget Act.  These costs are  
          unknown, but likely significant.  The bill does not provide for  
          reimbursement of Caltrans costs from project revenues available  
          to RCTC.