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Committee substitutes and advances House Bill 471 to let UDOT piggyback transit procurements
Summary
The committee approved a first substitute of House Bill 471 to let the Utah Department of Transportation use existing public transit contracts from other agencies to streamline vehicle procurement; UDOT and the Federal Transit Administration were cited as supporting the approach.
The Utah Senate Public Utilities, Technology, Energy and Transportation Committee approved a first substitute of House Bill 471, Transportation Procurement Amendments, and sent it to the Senate floor with a favorable recommendation.
Sponsor Representative Roberts said the bill "allows UDOT to streamline its procurement process by piggyback off of existing procurement contracts that other transit agencies in the state or throughout the country already have with transit vehicle manufacturers," and gave an example involving a contract option for additional rail cars. Representative Roberts said the measure is intended to shorten the procurement timeline, which can "typically take 2, 2 and a half years" for transit vehicles when issuing a new RFP and completing associated regulatory steps.
Ben Hewitt, deputy director of planning and investment for UDOT, told the committee: "As UDOT has been given responsibility for transit projects, for some of the transit projects in our state, we view this as a a valuable tool, especially for those projects where it includes procurement of transit vehicles. This is a tool that many entities around the country, use and FTA supports this tool." Hewitt said the approach would need to follow Federal Transit Administration regulations and guidelines when used on projects that require FTA compliance.
Senator Ipsen moved to delete the existing entitlement body language in House Bill 471 and substitute the first substitute; the motion passed. Senator Milner later moved that the committee pass the first substitute to the Senate floor with a favorable recommendation; the chair declared passage unanimous. No public testimony on the item was recorded.
Committee members asked clarifying questions. Senator Kwan asked whether any state or public entity has a procurement process ‘‘radically different’’ from Utah’s that would require caution; Ben Hewitt answered that the practice would need to align with Federal Transit Administration regulations. Senator Reby asked about the bill text change that appears to remove roughly 10 pages and replace them with one; staff clarified that the marked blue boxes indicate language removed from the bill for committee consideration, not that the content is permanently deleted from law.
The committee substituted the bill language and advanced the first substitute to the full Senate for further consideration.
