MADISON — Gov. Tony Evers and Wisconsin Department of Transportation Secretary-designee Craig Thompson announced July 7 more than $160 million in transportation aid for local governments as part of the governor’s 2019-21 biennial budget. Local governments will receive quarterly payments this week totaling $160,249,246 for General Transportation Aid, Connecting Highway Aid and Expressway Policing Aid from the WisDOT.

The local assistance increase is part of more than $465 million in new funding for transportation projects included in the governor’s 2019-20 state budget, the largest dedication of new, ongoing revenue to the transportation fund in a generation. The budget included $320 million in new funding for the State Highway Rehabilitation program, $1.9 million more for local roads and provided $75 million in one-time funding for the Multimodal Local Supplement grant program.

For calendar year 2020, local governments will receive more than $505 million in general transportation aids financial assistance to support transportation related projects. This is a 10% increase over calendar year 2019 allocations. In addition, $2.5 million also was allocated to towns that are limited by the 85% of three-year average cost limitations under the general transportation aids program. 

Payments to Wisconsin’s 1,850 villages, towns and cities include: $156,977,397 in General Transportation Aid; $3,015,875 to municipalities eligible to receive Connecting Highway Aid and $255,975 to Milwaukee County for Expressway Policing Aid.

General Transportation Aid helps cover the costs of constructing, maintaining and operating roads and streets under local jurisdiction. Connecting Highway Aid reimburses municipalities for maintenance and traffic control of certain state highways within municipalities.

Quarterly payments for cities, towns and villages are sent the first Monday in January, April, July and October. County payments are made in three installments, with 25% of the total annual payment on the first Monday in January; 50% on the first Monday in July and 25% on the first Monday in October.