AUDIT SHOW LACK OF HIGHWAY OVERSIGHT

It is becoming increasingly clear that Missouri's first-ever 15-year plan for highway improvements needed some kind of administrative oversight to keep is from becoming the mess it has turned into.

Missouri State Auditor Margaret Kelly's office recently found a lot of problems with how the Missouri Department of Transportation managed the plan.

Kelly said the department poorly monitored spending on projects. Neither did the department have any summary information comparing estimated construction costs to actual costs. The transportation department couldn't readily provide auditors information on the number of projects in the plan that have been completed or what remains to be done. The department also couldn't provide reliable cost estimates for remaining projects. Department records tracking the progress in implementing the road improvement plan are inaccurate or incomplete, the auditors found.

And, at one point, auditors found that as much as 25 percent of the road plan funds were diverted to projects outside the plan.

Transportation department officials acknowledge that the department hasn't tracked actual costs of road projects in the plan. They said many completed or ongoing projects are part of the plan, even though department records didn't designate them that way. And, they said, many projects not included in the plan have been added to construction schedules. Some were added because of federal mandates in Kansas City and St. Louis. Others were added for reasons that include traffic safety.

The Missouri Legislature in 1992 approved funding for the 15-year plan by imposing an incremental 6-cent increase in the state gasoline tax through April 1, 2008. The law that enacted the tax increase also dedicated Missouri's 11-cents-per-gallon gas tax at the time to the 15-year plan. Missouri had a $57 million shortfall for road projects, or 1.7 percent less revenue than had been originally anticipated, the auditors said.

The plan from the beginning has been plagued with financial problems, and unless some formidable oversight is taken, the problems -- for this or any other highway plan -- will prevail. A lot of thought went on in the Legislature to find a way to raise more money for road projects, but little is being done to track the plan.

As a result Missourians are in the dark on the status of many road projects. Taxpayers knew a lot more about where projects stood before the 15-year-plan came along.