Maine Turnpike Authority presents 2027 allocations, highlights $185 million toll revenue and multimodal investments
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Summary
Maine Turnpike Authority executive director Andre Brere told the Joint Standing Committee on Transportation that the authority generated $185 million in gross toll revenue in 2025 and proposed a 2027 operating budget of about $63.9 million; he described expanded use of the legislatively mandated '5%' for multimodal projects, including a $3 million contribution to a Scarborough–Portland transit line.
Andre Brere, executive director of the Maine Turnpike Authority, presented the authority's proposed allocations for calendar year 2027 to the Joint Standing Committee on Transportation on Feb. 3, highlighting recent toll revenue growth and several operational and capital priorities.
Brere said the turnpike generated "$185,000,000 in gross toll revenue and had 96,100,000 toll transactions" in 2025. He described the operating budget portion of the submission as roughly $63.9 million plus a 10% contingency and characterized the total request as a modest increase (about 3.55%) over the FY2026 budget.
Brere told members the authority is reviewing its EZPass discount structure with an eye to increasing discounts in the 2028 adjustment cycle and plans to release a customer app in late summer to make discount thresholds more transparent. He also described a strategy to broaden how the legislatively mandated "5%" contribution is used to seed multimodal projects; he cited a more than $3,000,000 contribution to a new Scarborough–Portland transit line as an example of that approach.
John Saroy, the authority's chief financial officer, explained line items such as travel and training (reported as "bridal and subsistence" in the budget detail), and laid out key sources and uses: the authority projects roughly $191–192 million in total revenue, with tolls representing about 95% of receipts; the proposed budget shows approximately $64 million in operating revenue, about $44 million in debt service, and a reserve maintenance target near $39.5 million as recommended by their engineering consultant.
Committee members probed procurement, contractor participation and work-zone safety after noting projects that had attracted only a single bidder; Brere said fewer bidders has been a national trend tied to federal funding cycles but that recent indicators are positive and that the authority is aligning bid specifications with MaineDOT and industry partners to attract more bidders. He also described ongoing IT modernization, cybersecurity work and a renegotiated concessions contract that he said includes a substantial, multi‑million-dollar service-plaza investment.
Next steps: The committee received the presentation and took no recorded final action on LD2152 during the hearing; with no remaining public testimony the committee closed the hearing and subsequently adjourned.