TIGER Discretionary Grants

The US Department of Transportation published a revised notice of funding availability for the $1.5 billion TIGER Discretionary Grant program in the June 17th Federal Register. Under this program, funds will be awarded to State and local governments who submit applications for capital investments in surface transportation infrastructure, including highway or bridge projects, public transportation projects, passenger and freight rail, and port infrastructure investments. Applications for TIGER discretionary grants must be submitted by September 15, 2009, from state and local governments, including U.S. territories, tribal governments, transit agencies, port authorities, MPOs and others. The Federal Register notice revises the interim notice published on May 18, and clarifies that the Department is no longer considering comments on the proposed selection criteria and guidance for awarding TIGER Discretionary Grants. The revised notice is the operative notice of funding availability for the TIGER Discretionary Grants program. The June 17th Federal Register notice is available at: http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2009/pdf/E9-14262.pdf. Additional information about the program is available at: http://www.dot.gov/recovery/ost/.

Summary of Changes
The revised Federal Register notice makes the following substantive changes to the notice published on May 18 (please read the notice for a complete description of these changes):

• provides additional guidance for evaluating a project’s costs and benefits; specifically, the notice (i) provides a discount rate for discounting future benefits and costs to present values, (ii) identifies guidance on the value of time and statistical lives, (iii) provides sources of information on the social benefits of reducing crash costs, pollutant emissions and other externalities, (iv) provides economic values for various benefits, including the cost of a metric ton of carbon emissions, and (v) clarifies that applicants should present a project’s net benefits, in addition to the project’s benefit-cost ratio;
  
• clarifies that MPOs are eligible grant recipients;
  
• clarifies that for this program “Economically Distressed Areas” is not limited to counties, but could include municipalities;
  
• includes additional guidance about which projects must be included in State or local planning documents to demonstrate readiness to proceed;
  
• clarifies that projects that have negative effects on any of the selection criteria are less likely to receive grant funds;
  
• clarifies that the Economic Competitiveness criterion targets investments that facilitate net new private sector expansion, hiring, or growth, rather than those that result only in moving existing jobs or economic activity to different locations;
  
• clarifies that while applications may be submitted prior to the September 15 deadline, the Department will not evaluate applications or announce projects selected to receive TIGER Discretionary Grants until after the September 15 deadline;
  
• requests that applicants include certain information on the first page of their applications;
  
• clarifies that recipients of TIGER Discretionary Grants and their first-tier sub-awardees are required to have a DUNS number (http://www.dnb.com/) and a current registration in the Central Contractor Registration (http://www.ccr.gov/ ) prior to award of a TIGER Discretionary Grant;
  
• includes requirements guiding the Department’s communications with registered lobbyists which were specified in the memorandum from the President of the United States dated March 20, 2009; and
  
• clarifies that the TDD number is provided for individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing.