WALLKILL- Lou Ingrassia, the immediate past president of the Orange County Highway Superintendents Association and DPW Commissioner for the Town of Wallkill, is preparing to travel to Albany with his colleagues from around the region for the first time in three years for their annual “Local Roads Matter” lobby day.
The New York State County Highway Superintendents Association and the New York State Association of Town Superintendents of Highways join forces to educate state elected officials about the need for local highway funding at this annual event, which has not taken place in-person since 2020 due to the pandemic.
“Programs that we’re supporting, like PAVE-NY and BRIDGE-NY are more important now than ever,” said Ingrassia. “More than 50% of the bridges in the country need some sort of attention because they were built decades ago and are starting to show their wear.” Most recently, Ingrassia used funding provided by NY Rising to redo culverts in the town to better prepare vulnerable areas for large rain events.
The requests by the highway superintendents in the upcoming state budget include increasing the CHIPS program by $200 million to $779 million, increasing the Extreme Winter Recovery funding by $70 million to $170 million, maintaining support for the BRIDGE-NY program at $200 million annually, maintaining support for the PAVE-NY program at $150 million, and continuing $100 million of annual funding to the State Touring Route program.
Goshen Town Supervisor Joe Betro spoke to the importance of state support when it comes to highway maintenance. “For municipalities like the Town of Goshen, state programs like CHIPS and the Extreme Winter Recovery fund make all of the difference. It is becoming increasingly expensive to resurface and repair road surfaces, and without the state’s support, the full financial burden would be shouldered by local taxpayers. I urge our state officials to aggressively support these budget requests,” said Betro.
Legislators in Albany are working on the state budget, which is due by April 1st. The total spending plan for 2024 is anticipated to be around $227 billion.
