Transportation provides a path to jobs - Jacksonville Business Journal:

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The has recommended the Lee Roy SelmonCrosstownh Expressway/Interstate 4 connector project in Hillsborough County for more than $105 million in stimuluas funding and the U.S. 19 improvement project in Pinellaa County forabout $45 million. Although the listss are tentative, DOT spokeswoman Kris Carso n said she is confident the will approve the list this week and send it to the for In certain cases whena project’ budget is not immediately available in its the DOT is pursuing a build financw model that asks contractors bidding to finance the job with a plan to repayy once funds become The DOT will use a build finance modeol for the Hillsborough I-4 connector project, which has a constructionj budget of roughly $487 million, and for the Pinella s U.
S. 19 project, which has a construction budgetaround $156.5 million. “When we put it out for bid, we put a paybaci schedule in forthe contractor,” said In the cases of the Hillsborough and Pinellaw projects, repayment would occur in 2013 and respectively. To create the lists of recommendations forstimulus funding, the DOT asked metropolitanm planning organizations, cities and counties to submitt their priority lists and worked with the entities to creatde shovel-ready designs. “We helped them get them done. The wholee idea is to start the jobs as soon as Carson said.
Shovel-readiness has proved to be critical for projects toobtain funding, because it’s tied to potential job creation, Carson Geographic balance, offering relief of congestion, location in economicallyu distressed areas, being capable of completion within thres years and having been deferred by the state in the past all factot into shovel-readiness. Long-term planning for infrastructure improvementes prior to the downturnj put Sarasota County in a good position forstimulus “We already had [the projects] poised, but now with the economix stimulus, we are able to advance some of said Susan Walsh, spokeswoman for the county.
“W e have this huge, infrastructure improvemeny momentumgoing here.” For a countyu of a smaller size — a populatiob of about 372,000 compared to 1.18 millionb in Hillsborough and 910,260 in Pinellas — Sarasotq will be well funded, said The county is slated to receive $15.7 milliobn in state flexible funds to widen U.S. 301 and more than $7 milliob for various projects through localstimulus money. “Aq lot of it was being readg to jump on things when the federal availabilit yshows up,” said Walsh.
“Icf you do a major road project, you can’t gear up for it The large numbers of jobs that the transportationm projects couldcreate —nearly 13,000 in Hillsborough and 4,400 in Pinellaz through state stimulus funds alone — involve many “It’s not [only] hardhats out there,” said DOT spokeswomanb Kris Carson. “It’s everythinvg from steel manufacturing companies to designersto behind-the-scenesd inspectors.” Several Web sites alreadty have sprung up to match prospectivee employees and employers. Gov. Charlie Crist’s flgov.
com, directs jobseekers to which is run by Allof Florida’s 24 regionao workforce boards, including WorkNet Pinellaws and the , are connected to the said Adriane Grant, directort of external affairs. “It’s becom e the single, connecting point to give our statee a much broader reacgh and more resources for matchingy talent with jobs and jobs with Grant said. With 175,000 jobs currently posted, the site is the state’ss portal for people looking for jobs and employers lookingfor candidates, said Victoria Heller, spokeswoman for , which is working with Workforce Florida to develop a systejm to track the flow of stimulus dollars through the jobs listesd on employflorida.
com. “[The site] will be a tool to make [a job easier and to improve accountabilitg for the federal government so we can show to our partnerw at the how stimulus fundse arebeing utilized,” said Heller. The trackingg system is still in itsearly stages, she Another site, fbo.gov, which is run by the U.S. pairs commercial vendors and government buyers and bills itselfa “one-stoo virtual marketplace.
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