In 2019, Vermont's Agency of Transportation completed a paving project on about seven miles of Route 117 from Essex to Richmond. The project cost $12.4 million dollars − $8.3 million over the original budget of $4.1 million. It also took three years longer to complete than was originally projected.
The Route 117 project was one of 14 projects examined by State Auditor Doug Hoffer in an audit of VTrans' performance on costs and scheduling of paving projects. The report was released on Tuesday, and concludes VTrans needs to get a better handle on tracking its projects and controlling costs.
Hoffer also calls for more transparency in the agency. He said VTrans "has not established measures to consistently assess the cost and schedule of its paving projects."
"Paving may not make for the most exciting headlines, but unnecessary project delays postpone the projects' benefits to the taxpayers who fund them," Hoffer continued. "And cost overruns, when they are avoidable, waste resources that could be used to fund additional projects."
VTrans busy with lots of paving projects
In a lengthy letter responding to the audit, VTrans Secretary Joe Flynn did not dispute any of the facts it contained, and acknowledged that "select projects within the Paving Program experience cost increases and/or schedule delays."
Flynn points out in his letter that VTrans project managers are very busy, often designing and delivering more than 20 projects every year. He said those projects directly contribute to VTrans' mission to keep people and goods moving on Vermont's roads. Based on 2022 data, he said, only 8% of roads in Vermont are in very poor condition, "which meets our performance goal of keeping the percentage of miles in very poor condition below 25%."
Flynn also points to the complexity of the job at hand.
"Project estimates and schedules are dynamic during the development phase of a project and can be influenced by a number of factors," Flynn said.
Among those factors, Flynn cites projects getting bigger, and being impacted by adjacent projects, changing priorities, limited budgets and "resource constraints." That said, Flynn concedes record-keeping could be better at VTrans.
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"Being that schedules and estimates are managed dynamically, the report is accurate in its statement that all changes or modifications throughout the life of a project are not formally documented," he said.
But, Flynn said, VTrans does track on-time performance and performs a comprehensive analysis of low bids on projects, comparing them against the cost estimates made by the agency.