Date: April 1, 2003

To: Planning & Zoning Commissioners, acting in your capacity as AMATS Citizens' Advisory Committee (CAC) members

From: James Armstrong, AMATS Coordinator

Re: P&Z Case, FFY 2004-2006 Transportation Improvement Program

On February 14th, the TAC approved minor amendment #7 to the 2001-03 TIP and released the draft 2004-06 TIP for a 30-day public review.

Table 4 &endash; Enhancements &endash; Regarding the Coastal Trail south extension project, the draft TIP does not program any new funding for the project since the public comment period for the draft Environmental Impact Statement has not yet concluded.

In addition, at their March 20th meeting, the Policy Committee approved a motion to include intent language to the Coastal Trail extension that reads:

The AMATS Policy Committee is considering changing the priority

ranking of this project to follow those projects necessary for completion of

major neighborhood trails (to follow projects 1 through 11).

New projects are shown with yellow shading and placed at the bottom of the table. Enhancements represent 14.2% of the proposed program.

Staff is preparing a 10% vs. 15% allocation scenario for TAC consideration.

Comment by Mike Jens:

Attached is the memo that is going to be presented to the P & Z Commission tonight by James Armstrong, the AMATS staff person. Take a look at the comments under "Table 4 - Enhancements".

This is where P & Z is being asked to agree or disagree with the mayor's plan to limit funding for the Coastal Trail and move it down the list to12th position. We should encourage P & Z not to support this at all. If they feel it is necessary to change the ranking on any project, they should re-rank all projects, not just the Coastal Trail.

Page 1 of the attached memo speaks to "Grandfathering" TIP projects in accordance with Policy Committee direction, which seems to be in conflict with their desire to single out the Coastal Trail and change the priority it has enjoyed from previous TIPs. Anyway, draw your own conclusions. It does seem like it will be worthwhile to try to influence the P & Z folks. It also looks like it might be a late night affair.

Of course, if Begich wins today, then we may not have the same hurdles to deal with.

Mike