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| Volume 18, Issue 2 | Spring 2006 |
North Dakota Breakout SessionThe ND projects met with Bruce Fuchs of the NDDOT at the mid-year conference. Bruce introduced Paul Benning. Paul thanked everyone for attending the conference. Paul mentioned that with more dollars coming to our projects it will mean more strings attached. Bruce shared the following items with the group: Can you claim funds you have put into an account to pay future match on a vehicle?
In regard to vehicle purchases, you must follow the competitive guidelines to be able to recover the cost of the vehicle. You cannot charge operating expenses to your 5311 expense reports because FTA considers this a non-revenue vehicle because it was purchased outside their competitive purchase guidelines. Also, you cannot recover from state aid because it states that the intent of state aid is to match federal aid. Bruce is working on the "State Management Plan." The plan will include the new procedures for procurement of vehicles. Once this is published we can all operate from a known set of rules. The 2007 buses will see a substantial price increase because the new emission standards will be in place. The chassis will have to be redesigned to accommodate the new emissions equipment, which will not only add costs but also create delivery days. If a project will need a new bus within the next two years, you are to get your application to Bruce ASAP. Paula has sent out the 5311 applications. Bruce felt that by the time the applications are in his office he should have the amount of available funds. The applications were due April 28th. Bruce touched on the budget. He mentioned that both North and South Dakota have increased their support for DTA. The support will go into specific programs with the training to be local as opposed to sending a number of people out of state. The CTAA Conference will be offered to three people. If you are interested you need to send an application into Bruce. The people chosen will be asked to attend the two day National Medical Transportation Conference. When they return, they will present training recapping the hilights of the conference to DTA members. Bruce wants all drivers, dispatchers and providers to attend PASS (Passenger Service and Safety) training. With several PASS trainers in the state, training will take place on a more local level. Bruce believes that any driver who becomes PASS Certified should receive a 1% raise. Bruce is looking at changing the capital section on the requests forms. It will be possible that we list only the 20% match as the cost of capital purchases. In the next go around of State Aid contracts; Bruce will be reviewing each county to see who is providing transit services and not receiving state aid. He has assured the group that this inequity will be taken care of. Bruce also stated they will start auditing how many elderly and disabled rides are being provided and the methods being used to track those rides. The computer response has been underwhelming. If you don't want the computer that you had requested some time ago, you need to let Bruce know. Bruce is requesting that all transit projects have a computer. If your project does not have a computer and does not plan on getting one he will combine that project with a regional project who has the ability to report electronically. Bruce mentioned that with the five-figure income from FTA he is requesting that all transit projects have an e-mail address. This will become the main communication tool and will be a requirement to receive either state or federal aid. Since Bruce has not received any comments or suggestions on the RTAP forms he will have them printed along with instruction sheets. Once printed they will be distributed for immediate use. RTAP reimbursement can no longer be paid directly to an individual. It would involve form 1099 and paying taxes on the funds. Therefore, the reimbursement will be paid to the project and the project will have to reimburse you and/or your employees. Bruce will need the following to reimburse a project: authorization travel form, itemized expense form and the lodging receipt. They will only pay for one vehicle from each project location to the conference site. Mileage payment will be on map miles from the project address (not home) to the training location and back. We were all delighted to hear the good news on insurance requirements. Any government-affiliated project will not be required to file any insurance forms with the NDDOT office unless they ask for them. This means that you must have on file proof of the insurance as required by the risk management appendix. It no longer requires a transit project to have a waiver of subrogation or have NDDOT as an additional insured. For private not-for-profit organizations you will be asked to submit proof of insurance with each agreement. The insurance must be in the amounts listed on the risk management appendix. These projects no longer need to list NDDOT as an additional insured and don't need a waiver of subrogation. Bruce will be randomly contacting projects for proof of insurance statements. If you are a third party contractor, it is up to you to see that they have the proper amount of coverage. They do not need the waiver but Bruce strongly urges your project be named on their policy as an additional insured. NDDOT does not need to be an additional insured. Bruce touched on Cami's training. He strongly encourages everyone to have necessary polices in place. We need to pay close attention to details such as how we state the frequencies of oil changes. This will assist you in preparing for an audit. 
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