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Agency engineers warn Buy America rule expansion could complicate Vermont highway projects, raise costs
Summary
State transportation engineers told the Senate Transportation Committee that new Buy America implementation and the sunset of a manufactured-products exemption will affect procurement, administrative workload and potentially material availability for traffic systems and other items.
Jeremy Reed, chief engineer with the Vermont Agency of Transportation, told the Senate Transportation Committee that recent federal rulemaking expanding Buy America requirements could materially affect state highway projects, increase administrative burdens and raise material costs.
Reed outlined the Buy America categories that now apply under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act: iron and steel products, manufactured products and construction materials. He said the longstanding manufactured-products waiver has been phased out by recent Federal Highway Administration guidance and a phased implementation creates immediate uncertainty for procurements and suppliers.
Under the new timeline Reed described, manufactured products must have final assembly in the United States starting on Oct. 1 (year specified in federal guidance), with a further domestic-content threshold (55 percent of…
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