Transportation, Technology & Legislative Affairs - Senate
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Bills discussed (13)
| Bill | Title | Sponsor | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
|
SB492
Act 699
· 7 mentions in chapter, agenda, transcript
Matched: “SB492 J. Bryant TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE RELOCATION OF UTI…”
|
TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE RELOCATION OF UTILITY FACILITIES; AND TO AMEND THE LAW … | J. Bryant | Notification that SB492 is now Act 699 |
|
HB1606
Act 922
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “HB1606 Steimel TO ALLOW A LOCAL GOVERNMENT TO AUTHORIZE THE OPERAT…”
|
TO ALLOW A LOCAL GOVERNMENT TO AUTHORIZE THE OPERATION OF A UTILITY TASK VEHICLE ON … | Steimel | Notification that HB1606 is now Act 922 |
|
HB1666
Act 656
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “HB1666 S. Meeks TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE ARKANSAS SELF-FUND…”
|
TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE ARKANSAS SELF-FUNDED CYBER RESPONSE PROGRAM. | S. Meeks | Notification that HB1666 is now Act 656 |
|
HB1688
Act 710
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “HB1688 Cavenaugh TO AMEND ARKANSAS LAW CONCERNING THE USE OF A DEA…”
|
TO AMEND ARKANSAS LAW CONCERNING THE USE OF A DEALER'S EXTRA LICENSE PLATE. | Cavenaugh | Notification that HB1688 is now Act 710 |
|
SB258
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “SB258 C. Penzo TO CREATE THE ARKANSAS DIGITAL RESPONSIBILITY, SAF…”
|
TO CREATE THE ARKANSAS DIGITAL RESPONSIBILITY, SAFETY, AND TRUST ACT. | C. Penzo | Died on Senate Calendar at Sine Die adjournment. |
|
SB330
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “SB330 J. Scott TO AMEND THE CONTENTS OF THE WRITTEN DRIVER'S LICE…”
|
TO AMEND THE CONTENTS OF THE WRITTEN DRIVER'S LICENSE TEST AND THE DRIVER'S INSTRUCTION MANUAL; … | J. Scott | Died in Senate Committee at Sine Die adjournment. |
|
SB447
· 2 mentions in agenda, chapter
Matched: “…FETY, AND TRUST ACT. REGULAR AGENDA Number Sponsor Subtitle SB447 J. Petty TO REQUIRE PERMITTED COMMON CARRIERS TO SUBMIT REP…”
|
TO REQUIRE PERMITTED COMMON CARRIERS TO SUBMIT REPORTS DETAILING SHIPMENTS OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES INTO THE … | J. Petty | Died on House Calendar at Sine Die adjournment. |
|
SB478
Act 738
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “SB478 G. Stubblefield TO CREATE THE ARKANSAS DIESEL ENGINE FREEDO…”
|
TO CREATE THE ARKANSAS DIESEL ENGINE FREEDOM ACT OF 2025; AND TO PROHIBIT STATE ENFORCEMENT … | G. Stubblefield | Notification that SB478 is now Act 738 |
|
SB496
Act 700
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “SB496 Caldwell TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING PERMITS FOR SPECIAL CA…”
|
TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING PERMITS FOR SPECIAL CARGOES; AND TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING … | Caldwell | Notification that SB496 is now Act 700 |
|
SB540
Act 702
· 2 mentions in agenda, chapter
Matched: “…IAL CARGO TRANSPORTED BY A FARM MACHINERY EQUIPMENT HAULER. SB540 M. Johnson TO LIMIT THE SUSPENSION OR REVOCATION OF A DRIVE…”
|
TO LIMIT THE SUSPENSION OR REVOCATION OF A DRIVER'S LICENSE OR IMPOSITION OF RESTRICTIONS ON … | M. Johnson | Notification that SB540 is now Act 702 |
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SB541
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “SB541 G. Leding TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE TOWING OR STORAGE…”
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TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE TOWING OR STORAGE OF A VEHICLE, IMPLEMENT, OR PIECE … | G. Leding | Died in Senate Committee at Sine Die adjournment. |
|
SB96
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “SB96 C. Penzo TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING DETACHMENT BY A REGION…”
|
TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING DETACHMENT BY A REGIONAL AIRPORT AUTHORITY; AND TO REPEAL REGIONAL … | C. Penzo | Died in Senate Committee at Sine Die adjournment. |
|
SB561
· 1 mention in agenda
Matched: “AGENDA (Revised 03/31/25 @ 2:45PM) Added SB561 Senate Committee on Transportation, Technology, and Legisla…”
|
TO ALLOW FOR THE ISSUANCE OF AN ADDITIONAL TEMPORARY PREPRINTED PAPER BUYER'S TAG IN CERTAIN … | M. Johnson | Died in Senate Committee at Sine Die adjournment. |
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- October 8, 2026
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
0:00
let's call the meeting order just so everyone I know we're going to hear bills up till 20 minutes till 7:00 at 20 minutes to 7:00 we're shutting it off for the day and so I want to make sure everyone's aware of that so we'll go through ever everything as fast as we can we're going to start with the senator Bryant and SB 492 and he has an amendment and anyone in the audience that wants to speak for or against these bills, you will have two minutes and Miss Jessica
will be the timekeeper over here. So we're going to make this thing go fast. I think we all pretty much know
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
0:51
where everyone stands. Senator Bryant. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Committee members, the amendment that's being
passed out is just some changes that were requested by different stakeholders as part of the bill as far as accommodating some of their asks communications to be expanded
to include limiting without limitation cable services of broadband service just expand the definition the railroad wanted to be excluded as a definition of utility we thought it did go that that way but they wanted it further expanded a couple of clerical issues and then the bulk of it was providing a notice for utility on the withholder of a permit application and then a 30-day cure period as well if a permit being withheld is used in an effort to get the utility to accomplish its mission. So that's the
goal of the amendment and with that I would like to make a motion to pass
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:49
the amendment. Have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor say aye. Opposed, same sign, the
amendment passed. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Committee. Please present SB 492
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
2:03
as amended. SB 492 as amended. Thank you again, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Committee. I'm going to try to as briefly go back for some context. And please introduce yourself for the record. Joshua Bryant, Senate District 32.
Back for some context, back in March of 2023, I was approached by some constituents throughout Northwest Arkansas, Obviously being a growing area about some issues completing projects, specifically RDOT projects, due to utilities holding up progress in projects. And that really was the impact to the construction companies that were delayed in the project, that were having to remobilize. But ultimately, what I really am trying to make the case for is it's the cost to the taxpayer and the cost to the commuter of the time and the delays of these projects.
So I started to research a little bit with RDOT about reasons for these delays and reasons for these issues. And I was approached by Representative Lanny Fite, who back in last session was going to run a bill. He never filed the bill because the session was ending, and so he handed it off to me and said, good luck on this fight, because it was going to be a fight. And I would say, you know, by the commitment to the audience, I would say this is a very important topic to our stakeholders, a very important topic to the state of Arkansas to
make sure these projects move forward in an efficient process and make sure they move forward in a fiscally responsible process. So I went to RDOT summer of 2023 and proposed the option of them going to rule. And the rule I pulled up was still on their website. It's dated back from summer of 2010. Prior to that, various iterations dating back all the way back to the 70s was still being implemented by the rule. And so my ask to them was, can we accommodate some of these by rule?
And what the brief scenario is, it's difficult because the stakeholders and the relationships are so, A, they were strained and they were critical to keep intact. Because the RDOT did not want to upset the utility because you can't go contract somebody else to do their work. And the utility was critical to RDOT because RDOT controls a lot of their permitting processes for work in the right of way. And so that was 2023, summer of 2024, I asked for an update.
There was really no movement on it, again, because of the issues. I asked RDOT that I stated I was going to make this a legislative priority because I think it's beneficial to the taxpayer and beneficial to the commuter to make sure these issues get addressed if there are issues. And what I found is there's issues in processes. The way things have always been done weren't getting it done. And so December of 2024, the stakeholders were gathered for a meeting at RDOT. I attended along with Senator Hester and Representative Lundstrom. And we laid out what would be potentially a bill for this legislative session that was not met with a whole lot of joy from the utility community.
And I'm not excusing RDOT at all for any type of liability for the issues and the processes that they implemented and have implemented over time. And I don't excuse utility for not attempting to work through those processes as well. I think both sides have equal blame in the situation. And not fault, but blame in trying to move forward this process. So the bill that RDOT proposed that was not well received,
I heard utility very loud and clear on a separate sideline meeting. And I said, well, you tell me what you would like to see in this bill. Go sit off by yourselves and tell me what you would see. And they brought back a proposal that as I went through waiting to see what I would object to, what I found is I objected to very little of the bill. I sat down with RDOT. They objected very little. Now, there were certain nuances that we just could not overcome. They wanted RDOT to buy the right-of-way for their purposes.
And that's just a hill that's really too high to climb, both constitutionally and trying to understand that process of what that would look like. RDOT wanted the ability to possibly do the work for the utility. Again, utility that's too high of a hill to climb because who's qualified to do that? So ultimately what we landed on was implementing an agreeable bill to both parties into the processes of which you see the bill here today. It establishes both a statute requirement and then a rule requirement
to make sure that parties meet on the same playing field and understand the longevity of the project, the scope of the project, the needs of the project, the timelines of the projects, the budget of the projects, things that were probably attempted to do in process but were not being achieved throughout the life of the project. And therefore, who was caught in the middle not only was the contractor but was also the taxpayer and the commuter.
So, just to identify a few portions of the bill, beginning on page three, really at the bottom, when negotiating a relocation agreement, the department shall, in the first several lines, halfway through the page, it talks about what the department will do. They will clearly identify known utilities. They will clearly identify their proposed right-of-way timelines.
They will clearly coordinate relocation agreement for the work to be performed by utilities. They will include the schedule for the relocation. They do all this work before they sit down with the utility and then ask for the utility to come back with an answer about reasonable schedules for completion of relocation, final dates, when they could begin, when they expect to complete, and then to submit a monthly progress report. That same type of language is also implemented within the rule.
So in the rule, that will be promulgated. There's guidelines to what to do, and then, of course, they can obviously expand that rule as they go through the rulemaking process. Again, identifying the scope, proposing the arrangements for relocation, identifying right-of-way, a deadline, a process of creation, a plan for relocation. All these things that should be happening are now going to be placed into not only statute but also into rule. Additionally in rule, to point out the last couple of things prior to going into where the tension of the bill arises
and what this committee will need to decide are the deadlines for completion and relocation and then the last page, page 10 lines 3A, the rules for relocation agreement shall include that relocation agreement may be modified if, skipping to II, Either party requests a modification to the relocation agreement, and the modification agreement shall be documented in writing, including updated timelines, costs, and other relevant terms, and be approved by both parties. So if you capture the scope of the bill,
it is we're going to establish procedures, timelines, costs, processes. The tension of the bill lies with what happens when the utility fails to meet their expectations, Or what happens when RDOT fails to meet the expectations? I think the bill addresses that in the sense of there's a 30-day progress report, monthly progress report. RDOT is implemented on certain projects, head-to-head meetings with department heads and contract heads to talk about specific issues going on with the project.
But what happens if, at the end of the day, the utility fails to do what they are agreed to do in writing prior months, if not years prior to getting to this point. They did not communicate that to the stakeholders. They did not communicate that to the contractor. They did not communicate that to really the taxpayer, which is who's controlling, trying to attempt to control the cost. The provision of the bill is the RDOT will have two main abilities and you can find that on page.
if i can find it page five page five beginning at lines eight if a utility other than a municipal utility system fails to follow the process established in the utility combination of rules or the relocation agreement to complete the relocation within a time period stated in agreement again that agreement is thoroughly processed and vetted like there's and plenty of
outs plenty of i couldn't acquire this i couldn't do that monthly report i i'm going to fail to meet this deadline we need to update the timelines what that what we will do is beginning line 12 we will give the department the ability to withhold approval of a permit application for utility work occurring on the right-of-way of the department or the commission by a utility except for permits requiring to address the emergency. So what that means in context is they already have the permits for the job they're on. They're expected to get the work completed. But if there's another project going on in the state
that requires them access in the right-of-way of the commission or RDOT, they have the ability, doesn't mean they'll use it every time, their intent will be an egregious issue that they need to get the utility's attention. But they will have the ability to withhold that permit until they have resolution on the work being upheld. Because we have timelines in the past that have been held up by months, if not years, waiting for progress to go at a cost to the taxpayer, at a cost to the contractor that signed to the work.
And the second was to assess and collect from utility a civil penalty under subsection E for their failure to comply. That's $500 a day. It goes into the fund that is used to accommodate other utility relocations. Utilities didn't have really a problem with that. They even said we can probably up the cost. The reason I want this committee to review the withholding of permits is because I think I'm over the target by the amount of fire that it's taking. That has really got their attention to say that we have to do better
and mean business by what we're going to do if a utility fails to comply after a months-long, if not years-long process to get them to be on time, on target, and if they're not, just let the department know so they can accommodate and move the appropriate resources or make things happen differently. So with that, with the chair's permission, I'd like to move to have RDOT come up here to address any questions or concerns and let them give a brief statement. That'll be fine. But while they're on
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
13:13
their way up here, I do want to address one thing that you said.
You made a comment that you started meeting with them in 23, again in 24, and there was very little differences, very little differences between all the sides when you
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
13:30
started coming together? Yes, yeah. I mean, we started kind of far apart, but we moved back
forward. This sheet doesn't show that. Again, you'll see that the contention is what I just discussed, which is the withholding of the permits. That is a hard nugget to swallow by the utilities. I think it's a critical piece of the puzzle,
and I would like for the Director of RDOT and his legal counsel to explain. So
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
13:53
are they going to speak for the bill, or are they speaking on the bill, or are they gonna
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
13:59
be here to take questions? Which way are you? - They'll speak on the bill and take questions. They're obviously for the bill, but again, it's a delicate balance with the utilities and RDOT.
Speaker 31
14:10
- Go ahead, sir. - Yes, sir, Jared Wiley, director of RDOT. Senator Bryant had summed the issue up very well from our perspective. I just wanted to reiterate that this process is complicated and complex.
- Mr. Wiley, if you would pull that mic closer to you. - You bet, you bet. Is that better? - Yes, sir. And it's a complex process that we go through to get projects ready to go to construction. Utility relocation is the last piece of the puzzle, typically, before we're able to build a road or relocate a bridge, reconstruct a bridge. To wait until all right-of-way is acquired before utilities begin their work, that would add probably another six months to a year
to our project development process. and so we would be opposed to that. But the process is complex, like I said, and it is about certainty for the taxpayers, certainty for the traveling public. The shorter duration that our work zones are out there on the highways, the safer it is for our drivers, and we wanted to be sure we mentioned that today. But with that, I'll close my comments and take any questions you
Speaker 33
15:19
have. Good evening, Michelle Davenport. I'm Chief Counsel with RDOT.
I just wanna speak very briefly to some of the things that RDOT did look at for rulemaking in this area and some of the actions that RDOT had taken to work with Senator Bryant to resolve some of these issues, including the creation of a new position, which is a utility relocation coordinator who works directly between the department and they're inspecting out on the job because we had some problems with utilities being located in incorrect locations in consistent plans. So we have someone now on the ground in each of our districts who works directly with the utilities.
And that was something that RDOT was able to do within our own rules and within our own processes to try to make that process more collaborative and work better with the utility systems. In the bill, you will see we worked with all the stakeholders that we knew we could. You'll see that municipal utilities came to Senator Bryant with the proposal that they actually liked the provision where the department could step in and assist them in moving their utilities if they ran into conflicts and problems, and that's something that RDOT was absolutely willing to do. That was on
the table for all utilities if they wished to go that route. The utilities said they were not comfortable with that, so that's why it was originally removed. The municipalities asked us to put that back in to them specifically. The other provision that was eliminated from one of the early proposals that had been discussed was a private right of action that if a contractor was damaged in the process of a utility not relocating based on the schedule that they provided that the separate contractor would have a right of action back against the utility. Again,
we saw some potential problems with that and we were happy to remove that in coordination with utilities and a good faith effort of trying to come to the best proposal. With regard to one of the primary issues here, and that's the holding of permits. I think that's something that has been slightly lost in this discussion. Of course, this is actions that are recurring on state property. So that is why we have a permit to begin with, is these are actions and activities that are occurring with on the property of the state. And so the review and the withholding of that permit
is actually something that's within the normal course of what a state agency does, is they look at the processes and the permits that are out there and how they're going to move those forward. We felt like that was a very simple way to make sure everybody was coming to the table. That has been one of the issues that we identified when we did a very widespread look at the problems that we were facing with utility relocation. And one of those problems was getting everybody to the table to discuss things early on in the process.
And we felt that this would be a mechanism that we could make sure that was happening effectively. but I'll be happy to
Speaker 36
18:12
answer any questions of a technical nature
Speaker 38
18:16
on the bill. Okay, questions from the committee? Go ahead, Senator Dease. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
18:23
Will you help me with the most common real example of where this happens? So is this a state highway expansion situation? It's a two lane, it's going to a three or four lane, and there's already utilities there,
or is this new development and they're contracting or permitting utilities that aren't there yet? Will you kind
of walk through some of those situations maybe first? I would say,
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
18:47
Senator Dees, I think the most common is the expansion or improvements of an existing road. So like in our area, 112 is going to be a major project, Fayetteville to Bentonville, huge undertaking. I mean, it goes through decades of growth of K-Springs, Elm Springs. And so that would be one. In
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
19:05
that example, there's power lines going down the road currently.
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
19:08
Power lines, underground, communication, underground,
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
19:11
gas. Okay. And so the decision is made to expand. And then so there's obviously a conflict that's been going on right now across the state on the speed to expand and to move the utilities. But the permit process, so if utilities aren't moving fast enough and meeting their agreements,
I guess what I was concerned about is this is giving the ability, or maybe there already is the ability, it's an issue to kind of have some retribution back and delay other projects and permits. If they're not agreeing on unrelated to that in scope project, RDOC can hold other permits. That seems kind of funny in my
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
20:01
mind. Yeah, I think the important piece is this is not like 112 was not thought of today. It was thought of 10 years ago. And that process is a long, arduous process to make sure everybody is in agreement.
Now, the process now, that agreement may look like an email. Obviously, bureaucracy of RDoC, bureaucracy of utility. You have employee attrition coming and going. You've got engineers changing jobs. You've got management leads changing because it is a long process. What this bill proposes is we're going to now have it in writing. And we're going to have ins and outs, exit ramps, on ramps of this process. And the expectation is going to be agreed upon by both parties. If you decide that you want to break that expectation, you have to communicate that.
If you communicate it, they're going to figure out a way and work through it. If the utility communicates back to RDOT. Yeah, or RDOT communicates to the utility. What happens, what is common very frequently, you know, I talk to county judges, Sebastian County, Saline County, White County, what is very common is there'll be a project, just stop. Contractors go away. Machines out there, you know, sometimes running, sometimes not, because it's based on hours of running machines on their pay apps.
But when they ask two months to go by and there's no progress, what's going on, it is typically the response but the contractor states is we have a problem utilities aren't out of the way yet and it may be they didn't know it may be that they just don't have the capacity to relocate those utilities regardless what has happened is the meter's still running the commuters are still being delayed and nobody's is taking any action
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
21:44
and so is it fair is it fair to say that i mean And
both groups, both entities, RDOT and utilities, they both want expediency, hit the deadline.
Nobody's wanting to delay because everybody's incentivized to get done faster. And so there's a little bit of a hand pointing going on. And so I think my last question, Mr. Chair, is trying to understand maybe which is better. You've got delaying of permit situations and civil actions, and then you also have on RDOT's side, I'm sorry, the utility side pointing at maybe RDOT saying, well, you need to get all the right-of-ways purchased, and you're saying that's going to delay us 6-12 months.
So, you see what I'm saying? There's kind of those which one's faster, which one's not, and which one's
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
22:38
appropriate, which one's not. I think that's what we're debating, right? And I think, again, that's part of the outline of the bill is they're going to tell the utility when they expect to have that right-of-way done. Purchased? Purchased, moved, and then the utility is going to answer back, well, if you meet that deadline, I can meet this deadline. And if they can't meet that deadline in the monthly reporting, that's when they say this landowner is causing a headache because that's a whole different process of courts and legal proceedings.
But if there's no communication and there's nobody coming to the table, then we have millions of dollars of taxpayer money being on the line. Waiting. Waiting. Thank you. And just to address the final part of your permit question, these aren't, you know, permits that are being issued, being recalled. These are, again, these are permits that they will come and ask RDOT for about a project they have to improve their facility or to do other work for their facility that RDOT will look at and say, what are we doing about this over here?
And if there's no response, then the potential is they
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
23:47
get withheld. Senator Dismang. Thank you. How long have the utility coordinator positions been in play? How long have they
Speaker 61
23:55
been filled? We just filled those late last year, so they've been in the
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
24:00
field probably a month or two now, Senator. Okay, and what would be the impact of withholding these permits or the approval of additional permits? Does that not have the same potential to then almost create a chain reaction?
I mean, it would appear to
Speaker 33
24:18
me that it would. In this situation, we're looking at things of withholding permits for jobs that have not yet been let to contract. So the focus is on jobs that have been let to contract that we are depending on a schedule certainty that was provided by the utilities. And that's the whole point Senator Bryant was making about the process is we're going to reach that agreement where everyone has a schedule certainty. Any permit withholding would be to simply provide a delay if they have enough resources to be able
Speaker 65
24:47
to prioritize their work based on the commitments that they themselves have established.
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
24:53
Take AT&T, putting in fiber. How many projects, permits do they have pulled that they're working on at one time
in the state? And would you say? Quite a few. Right. That's fine. I think that was kind of my point. It's kind of quite a few. I mean, do you think enough time's passed with what you've done yourselves in trying to better the relationship? Because it sounds like there was a shortcoming. If we're hiring somebody, something wasn't working.
passed to be able to, I mean, is this solution absolutely needed, or is this something that we're wanting? Because we haven't let the new process kind of play itself out yet. So this solution helps
Speaker 31
25:39
us when we have a utility company who's not willing to engage with us. So we had a project in northwest Arkansas a few years ago where a utility dug their heels in, and they just said, you know, we're not moving, we're not talking to you. And that project was delayed by three years until the courts had it and then three and a half
million dollars in cost escalation were borne by the taxpayer. So this is meant to be used as a last resort but it would be a good tool for us to have.
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
26:08
The last resort portion I get, we're not too far removed from a very heavy handed RDOT and that is my concern. There's contractors signed up to speak for this bill that I think would tell you that there was a pretty heavy hand used by RDOT in a number of different situations. I understand the culture's changed. I understand we have a new commission,
and I much appreciate the change in direction, but it may not always be that way. Again, my concern is that we've not let some of this play out that we've put in process to see if we're going to be able to achieve the results that we want to achieve, but I'll leave it there
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
26:45
for now. Mr. Wiley, I'd like for you to expand on one thing. You mentioned the Project Northwest Arkansas, $3.5 million later,
Speaker 31
26:53
who was that? Who was the company? The utility company was named Washington Water. It's a water association. Okay, thanks, sir. Yes, sir. I'd like to call names out
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
27:02
if we're going to use them. Yes,
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
27:06
sir. Got you. Senator Johnson. Thank you,
Mr. Chairman. Mr. Wiley, and I'm speaking from memory, so I want to clarify. The poster child for a delayed project is probably our I-30 through Saline County. I was told hearsay, I don't remember where, that the original contractor had a problem with the utility. And it may have been a mistake they made
or something the utility made. But regardless of that, utility delays, I understood, were a specific stumbling block to the project in Saline County. do I recall that correctly or can you clarify where the utility issue not pointing blame in any direction the contractor or the utilities but it was a major consideration toward some of the delay that happened in that project it was going on thank you senator to
Speaker 31
28:00
my knowledge that was not an issue I'm gonna
look back at my staff here no it was not an issue there was an underground pipe drainage pipe that wasn't utility related I think that was part of that discussion, but no, utilities were not. They may have used the drainage as a utility in
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
28:17
a generic sense, not as we are using it. Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you for your answer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Any
Speaker 36
28:27
other questions from the committee? If you don't mind.
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
28:32
Senator Dismayne. And I just want to make, I mean, so again, my concern is there's no
intermediary in this situation between the utilities and you. You are going to be the final arbiter of
whether or not these get pulled if I'm reading it correctly. Am
Speaker 31
28:49
I misreading it? So we would promulgate rules and there is an approval, I mean an appeal process that's built in. Michelle can
Speaker 33
28:58
speak to that. We have included in our rulemaking the Administrative Procedures Act, an ability to say if RDOT is not following its procedures or implements any of these actions and there is a disagreement by the utility, they have the ability to go through an appeals process
just as with any other state agency that is working with a permit and they would go through the Administrator's Procedures Act to have a hearing before someone outside of the utility section. That's what's going to be developed in the rules is to develop that process. If we compare it to, say, our beautification process or our other kinds of relocation processes, we have a panel in relocation from different parts of the department that evaluate the information and come up with findings of fact that are then able to be appealed to the circuit court.
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
29:43
So that's following the Administrative Procedures Act, and that will be in the rules. Which would be quite the process, right? But in the initial step on the pulling of the permit, I'm assuming all that would get stayed. You'd pull a permit, you're going to work through that process, and whatever else happens is delayed there. So, again, I feel like it puts you at a very high position, and that is my concern, is that language and how much authority we're delegating, wouldn't you agree?
Speaker 33
30:20
we're working within the state's property itself, and that's the system that the state has set up, that all of the utilities that choose to be relocated on the right-of-way, of course, have to have a permit to perform that work. And so if they have right-of-ways that are off the highway, this would not affect their work on any of those processes. It would only be a hold and not even a denial of a permit, but a brief hold on any permits on working within the right-of-way
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
30:47
would not stop their other operations. And just to add, Senator Desmayne, part of the amendment was just that RDA has
to provide notice that this is an option that they might exercise because they're not getting any action out of utility. And then if they do exercise, say they're going to exercise, if there's a 30-day period for utility to, again, come to them and saying hey per the rules we're going to make this right or better and then lastly just because you're in construction um you work with cities to pull permits you know while this
authority is not enumerated uh they can sort of delay or slow roll things now and this just provides transparency to in order to get the utility because they can't hire a company to move utility. If the contractor is not moving, they can, you know, cancel that contract, you know, or withhold and do different actions, but they
can't do that to utility. They have to have a mechanism to get them to the table. I'd like you to
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
31:53
expand just a little bit more on the appeals
process. I know you said you know, sir. Take me through the step before it gets to circuit court. Who is going to make up this committee? Are they RDOT
Speaker 33
32:07
employees or whom? Under the current Administrative Procedures Act, yes. That's how the agency action is set up for the entire state when we're dealing with a permit action. So in this particular provision, we have not finished and finalized the rules. The legislature will have the opportunity to approve those rules. Well, under this,
we were voluntarily bringing them to the legislature because it was coming out of statute rather than out of our independent authority. That's
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
32:34
specifically stated that we're going to approve these? We all are specifically excluded from approval right now. Yes, sir, with
Speaker 33
32:44
regard to any matters that are not legislatively mandated. And so we viewed this as requiring us to promulgate those rules
Speaker 65
32:50
through the legislature and legislative process. So that is why we said in, I apologize, let me get to that portion of the bill.
And we indicated that the rules will be promulgated under 2767-- that's referring to that.
Speaker 37
33:10
Just one moment. Beginning on page 8, line 20 is where we talk about the rules.
Speaker 65
33:29
I'm sorry, that was in an earlier version. This just sets out the matters that they will be approved. Page 9. On page 8, line 17, it just states that the department shall promulgate the rules for the implementation of this section. Pursuant to the Administrative Procedures Act.
Administrative Procedures Act is referenced in page 6, line 16, to set out the appeal process. But I apologize, that wasn't an earlier version where we specifically... Say that page again. The APA is referenced on page 6 with regard to the hearing procedures, but it is not now referenced under the rule promulgation under page 8, line 17.
Speaker 37
34:36
It just indicates that we will promulgate
Speaker 33
34:41
those rules. But to finish your question, we anticipated setting that up exactly like our personal property or commercial relocation procedure under the Federal Relocation Act, And we would have a panel of three people from the department. They would be department employees who would, you would have someone from the legal division to ensure that they were following the rules, and you would have two other individuals. One would be an engineer who was familiar with planning, but not from the utilities or right-of-way section.
So they would be employees from other sections of the department that would initially make their recommendation and have that to the chair for the administrative hearing officer. Again, yes, an department employee, but then that determination by the administrative hearing officer would then be appealable to circuit court. And I appreciate that, but
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
35:30
I've never had a fair hearing any time I'm going against the committee that works for the company that I'm going against. I've never seen a fair hearing that way because they know who writes their paycheck.
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
35:44
Any other questions? Senator Dees. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I
guess I wasn't familiar with, I guess, maybe the permitting process, too. When I think utilities, my mind always goes to the PSC and think about permits and overview. So there's no coordination with the Highway Commission and PSC board at all. And I'm wondering if maybe that's a better solution with two, I don't know, oversight.
Has there ever been a conversation that way or coordination at all with
Speaker 94
36:23
those two entities? No, sir. Under 2767-304, that is the statute that determines
Speaker 33
36:28
the use of the right-of-way of the commission. And that is the section that allows utilities even to be on state property because the statutes indicate that the right-of-way shall be held in violet for state highway purposes. And this is an exception
Speaker 65
36:43
to that, that allows a utility to locate their facilities on department
or commission right-of-way if they follow the permitting process established by the department. Senator Love, you had a question? Any other
Speaker 8
36:57
questions? Seeing none, we'll go against, yes. We'll start with Linda
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
37:15
Lamb speaking against. And remember all those speaking for or against the bill, you have two minutes.
And just so we'll be ready, speaking for this next will be
David Foster, so please begin ready. Please introduce yourself for the record. Pull that mic to you and push the button down at the bottom. Here you go, and pull it down
Linda Lamb
Unverified
37:51
to you. There you go. - Can you hear me? Yeah. My name is Linda Lamb and I'm the in-house counsel for Carroll Electric Cooperative. We're located in Berryville, Arkansas.
There's several things that concern me about the bill and Senator Dismain pretty much hit on those. I think there's a due process problem with the withholding permitting and with the RDOT fining or the civil penalty or whatever they're calling it. There's no hearing allowed for the utility.
It's a, we said you're not following the rules and we're going to do both. I think they can actually do both. We can withhold permits and we can also implement this civil penalty. Then you get your hearing afterwards. It's an appeal process. If you look at the Administrative Procedures Act, that's not even how it works. It says, first thing, notice and hearing. So we're skipping a pretty big part of what a utility,
the only power or the only control that the utility would have over this. So you go straight to the appeal process and you're fighting backwards. You've already been found guilty, basically. And it says that they're going to issue a show cause order or something to that effect. So that's pretty much a presumption that's already against you, that says you're guilty. So I'm having, I really believe that there is a major due process concern for the utilities in this.
And I understand that they're talking about promulgating rules and, you know, doing things like that. And that's fine, but the rules aren't part of the statute. the statutes, what we're talking about here. Your time is up. I mean time's up. Okay. All right. Do
Speaker 126
40:00
I need to answer any questions or anything? Do
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
40:04
we have any questions? Seeing none. Thank you. Thank you.
We have David Foster speaking for, and then next we'll have Andrew Branch speaking against.
Speaker 128
40:26
Thank you. David Foster with APAC Central in Fayetteville. Yeah, we're for
Speaker 129
40:32
this bill, and Senator Bryan, I think you worded it exactly through your research of exactly what the issues are here. I think what this bill does is it establishes accountability on both sides of the table.
Speaker 130
40:46
And I think the whole intent here is that we can find a way to get both sides of the table together earlier in the process. We've got a number of projects that in two minutes I can't discuss that we've had major delays and impacts to our company over the past few years. And what I mean goes back as far as 18 years ago, we actually gave a job back to the highway department because of utility delays. But on a positive note, I think something this bill can do is to get everybody to the table early in the process.
And an example of that is we have the current CMGC job at MLK Boulevard and I-49 interchange. And the utility coordination is under our scope as the construction manager of that job. And we've been, during the investigation of utilities, we went early on to
Speaker 129
41:41
all of the utilities. And at first we met some resistance. But during those meetings when they found out what we were trying to do at that point at 30% plans,
Speaker 130
41:53
at 60% plans, to get them started thinking about their relocation work, I think it helped improve that process and everything seems to be moving pretty smoothly on that job right now. So hopefully we won't have those issues. But I think that's
Speaker 129
42:07
something that this bill does in our mind. I think it really helps bring everybody together to the table at an earlier standpoint to help alleviate some of these issues. Any questions
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
42:22
on the committee? Senator Love. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So when you say major delays, how long are you talking?
Speaker 128
42:27
So we've had two in the past five years that have been over a year long. What do
Speaker 130
42:37
you mean over a year long? So we actually get started on the job and end up encountering delays that took an actual year to get resolved so that we could go back to work. One of them, we were not the prime. I think Manhattan Road and Bridge was the prime, but it was the Whittington interchange on 49, and I think, and somebody else can fact check me on this,
but I think it was 397 days is what the delay was. Okay, all right, thank you. Senator Johnson.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
43:20
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That was a shocking number. I think
when we get into it, we think about a regulatory thing, you've got this entity and this entity, and then they do it.
But you guys are the guys in the middle. The contractors, you bid based on estimated time to mobilize and get on there and tie up your equipment and your employees and all that. So I know it's possible, but do you see often where these kinds of delays take a job from being on budget and you get it done on
time and you make money and those that you might lose money.
Is that happening? That is exactly what's happened. So this could actually hurt employment and hurt, obviously, hurting getting the highway built.
Speaker 129
44:12
Exactly. So, you know, two things. It delays the job, and if it delays the job, we have priced out a job based on what our production rates are going to be and the time frame. So if we bid a job in 2025 and we get delayed a year, that job that should be completed in 26 may go over in 27.
But we're still doing that job on the prices we submitted in 25. I think it would be done in
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
44:42
26. Even if concrete and rebar and everything goes up.
Speaker 130
44:47
Yes. And one thing I would say, too, is we're for profit. So if we take a loss on a job due to this, it's going to cost the taxpayers because we're going
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
45:01
to try to recoup that somewhere else along the line. Would you see a situation or any, theoretically or
actually, where your assets, employees, equipment are tied up waiting on this job to work out so you can complete it?
Would it keep you from bidding and getting new business on other things because of the commitment of your assets to the former
Speaker 128
45:25
project? Absolutely. Because when these delays start,
Speaker 129
45:31
too, you don't know what that delay time frame is going to be. So, you know, we have to have a certain number of backlog on our contracts to keep things moving. So if we get stopped for two months or two years on a job, we have to figure out how we're going to correct that.
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
45:55
Thank you. Any other questions on the committee? Walk me through that utility issue.
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
46:01
Who was it? What was happening? What delayed it for a year? That one, I might refer,
Speaker 130
46:08
I'd have to refer to the department on that one. I wasn't personally involved in that job per se, so I don't know if it was, it could have been anything from underground utilities overhead. it could have been water and sewer I'm not I don't know exactly but Jared or
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
46:29
answer that. So from just from y'all's opinion you just know that the highway department told you to stop because they were having
Speaker 128
46:38
utility issues? Well no we actually started that job so we actually had moved out and and and started the project so the drums were out there
Speaker 130
46:45
we were it looked like the job was fully under construction and you
Speaker 129
46:51
start working and you encounter that utility that's in the way that now stops you from progressing that project or that that work so at that point you
you've got two of you just sit and wait or you have to pull off the job but you don't know when you start at what that time
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
47:08
frame is going to be someone needs I'm not sure that I understand because if we were going to map out and we're going to be repairing or doing whatever we're going to do for a section
if I'm understanding it correctly, we start working and then we learn that there's a utility here so
Speaker 158
47:22
then we stop work. Correct. If that's on the critical path
Speaker 130
47:27
you have you stop or or if there's a way to
skip over that and keep going but that affects that affects
Speaker 128
47:34
production everything else but if there's a if there's enough utilities it will actually stop stop progress on the project. I may need to understand
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
47:43
the process better at some point then because I don't understand how those would still be there, or why you would start not knowing they were
there. There's something I don't understand, but I think they're nodding their heads in the back. Okay. Seeing
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
47:59
no other questions of the committee. Thank you, sir.
Charlie Spikes. speaking against please introduce
Speaker 162
48:23
yourself for the record charlie speaks with black hills energy we worked with senator bryant we understand the need the process we have two big issues the permits obviously being a huge one and then the other issue was adding language that would
not start the timeline until we have acquired right away it's hard for me to give you a timeline. If you know the right of way process, I don't know if that's going to take a month. I don't know if that's going to take three years to get through the right of way process. So once I get through that process and I know where those utility lines are going to go, it's a lot easier for me to give you a realistic timeline. And we've talked about this and they said that would be negotiated on the front end. And if that's the case, why can't it be clear in the language
that that's going to be the expectation um and then I guess the other issue is that you know it was said that this is trying to make a even playing field and it just feels like one of the players gets to be the ref in this instance um so it doesn't feel super even so there's a lot we like with the bill we were involved in the start of it in early 2024 and then we kind of left behind on What we kind of said was our two biggest issues.
Senator Bryant was awesome to work with, and he worked out a lot of the process with me, but the two biggest issues for us as Black Hills Energy is the permit withholding and then needing language in there that specifically addresses right-of-way and the timeline in that instance. And then some of it's like we can't get our right-of-way until RDOT gets their right-of-way. We'll go to a landowner, and they'll say, well, I'm not talking to you until I'm done with RDOT. Well, in this, it makes us give monthly reports to RDOT.
I don't see where RDOT's gonna give us monthly reports about how their right-of-way acquisition's going. So I just don't feel like some of those are one-sided and we wanna be helpful and good partners. - Thank you, sir. - Thank you. - Any questions? Seeing none, thank you, sir. D.B. Hill
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
50:45
or Will? I can't tell. Hill, there we go. I should know that name.
Speaker 167
51:09
Mr. Hill, please introduce yourself for the record. - I'm D.B. Hill III, a lifelong highway contractor here
Speaker 169
51:22
in Arkansas and representing AGC and AAPA as well. I'm naturally for this legislation. I think among other things, this is a fairness issue between the contractors and the utility and the highway department.
When RDOT advertises a job to be let to contract, we purchase the plans and the proposal. In the proposal schedule are specific specifications for that job. Among those special provisions for that job are listed the utilities that are gonna be encountered there. They're listed by name, the contact people, phone numbers,
and their estimated date of completion that they have furnished RDOT prior to the job being let to contract. We base our bid on those special provisions, the plans and the standard provisions. If we see a date of March the 31st, 2025, is a date to complete, then our entire schedule is built around
when all the utilities are going to be done. So if a utility or more than one are not moving their facilities, then we are delayed like David was talking about. And Senator, you ask about the delay and why we just can't jump around it. I think more or less is what you said. Did I misunderstand that?
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
53:20
No. Yes, sir. But I can restate that for you. Go ahead and restate the question. Yeah, no, my question was trying to understand what caused the 365-day delay or whatever it was. And his response, I mean, was something to the effect of they found a utility, which wasn't the way that I understood the process to work. I understand it more like what you've just outlined, which they're identified. There's a schedule for moving. And that's not that we would find a utility that we didn't know about and then we had a problem moving.
Speaker 169
53:50
I have seen the time when ones were found that were not recognized on the front end. Granted, that is not common and ordinary, but it's not out of the realm of possibility. So it also depends on the length of the job about moving around the utility. Access to the job is how we can get back and forth to it.
So in my mind, this makes the utility obligated to finish when they say they're going to finish. The department penalizes us as contractors when we don't finish on time. Only
Speaker 173
54:49
being fair that, and I think the legislation allows them to express why they can't be done.
I mean, hurricanes, tornadoes, stuff that we know that can delay them, that's fair when they're trying to get other stuff done. - Did that answer your question? Okay, any other questions, committee? Seeing
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
55:15
none, thank you, Mr. Hill. Brian Bowen speaking against. Please state your
name and who you're with for the record.
Brian Bowen
Unverified
55:41
Thank you, Mr. Chair. My name is Brian Bowen and I am with Summit Utilities. I'd like to first thank Senator Bryant for working with the utilities on this bill to get us, I think, to where we are today and I'd like to address our primary concern with the bill. We echo what you heard from Mr. Spakes. Our primary concern is the withholding of permits. There are situations in which we may be working on a highway project where there are delays but looking at another project that would the highway department might have an ability to deny a permit in an emergency or safety situation.
I know there is an exception for emergency situations that arise in the bill, but we may have a situation where we're doing a line replacement because of a leak that is on our schedule where we're working in the highway department right-of-way, and that would potentially allow them an arbitrary basis to deny a permit for us to do regularly scheduled maintenance on a line within the highway department's right-of-way, which creates a safety issue for our company.
customers and the communities in which we serve. With that, I'm happy to answer
Speaker 36
56:54
any questions. Any questions from the committee?
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
56:58
Senator Love. And I feel to ask the previous utility, but I did want to ask this. So when you look around, I don't know, you might have multiple projects. Do you all have delays? And if so, what does your average delay look
Brian Bowen
Unverified
57:16
like? - I will speak generally, there are instances of delays.
Usually one of the delays that we see is the acquisition of easements for the utilities, which as Mr. Spake said, oftentimes we're told that private landowners will not deal with us until they've settled with RDOT, which would create a delay in the process that we see. Rain or inclement weather in one area of the state may delay that specific project, but not affect another project that we have going on. I also so within
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
57:46
let me let me just ask you this what had what has been one of
your longest delays you say on the job I am not
Brian Bowen
Unverified
57:56
aware of one off the top of my head I'm happy to get back with you on that but I'm not aware of any major delays caused directly by summit utilities no major delays for summit no sir not that I'm aware and I will say
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
58:10
to I want you to be aware of that because I want to I mean I
Brian Bowen
Unverified
58:14
want you to answer the question but yeah I am not I will say for highway department projects we try and prioritize those as well because we know the importance of getting that handled as quickly as
Speaker 186
58:24
possible okay all right thank you Senator Scott
Senator Jamie Scott
Unverified
58:28
thank you mr. chair the specific example that you just gave did you talk to senator Bryant about that to try to address that specific concern we
Brian Bowen
Unverified
58:37
have we have addressed our objection to the withholding of permits with Senator Bryant, yes ma'am. - In regards to that
Senator Jamie Scott
Unverified
58:45
specific example though that you just gave us. - I
Brian Bowen
Unverified
58:49
don't recall if we specifically talked about that and I don't want to put words in our mouth.
We have been working very closely with Senator Bryant and he is aware of, like he stated, the utilities objections primarily come from permit withholding. - Thank you,
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
59:09
any other questions for the committee? - Saying none? - Nope, Senator
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
59:15
Dease. - All right, maybe I want both sides to be able to maybe answer
this. But again, for simplistic, road needs to expand, there's utilities running down the road,
and I gotta map it out. And so, road can't expand until y'all move your utilities over. You can't get land next to you from the private land owners. Am I describing this right? - That would be a scenario, yes. - And then this bill is gonna say that RDOT is gonna point the figure at you, utilities, because you can't get the land fast enough and you're
saying we're trying. And this bill is saying we're gonna fine you. Am I describing that fairly?
And I want both sides to ask
Speaker 188
1:00:01
if I'm describing them fairly. - I think
Brian Bowen
Unverified
1:00:04
that there is the potential for that, but I think the bill contemplates that in the negotiation back and forth between the Department of
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
1:00:11
Transportation and the utilities. - Okay, and I'll let the bill sponsor in his
closing get that side as well, but you're saying that's a realistic scenario potentially where you're doing everything in your power to try to get easements, right-of-ways, and while you're trying your best,
this would say that RDOT can fine you and a civil penalty potentially, and
Brian Bowen
Unverified
1:00:34
that's a concern. - It is a concern. I think we'd like some clarification around, like Mr. Spake said of exactly when the time starts to toll against the utilities. So some clarifying. - Even worse than the penalty, the
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
1:00:46
thing I think I had the base issue is, is that this also says that, yes, on that project, we're talking about you're delayed, but we're gonna hold a project 30 miles down the road as well because we're upset. - That is our, yes, sir.
- And I wanna hear Senator Bryan, if you wouldn't mind address in your close. Thank you.
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:01:06
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, sir. Just for the audience to know, this will be the only bill we're hearing today, but we are going to hear this one out. And so if you're here for any other bill, this will be the only one we're hearing. And we're ready for Mr. Brian McMillan.
We'll see. if not I guarantee we can get you
Speaker 200
1:01:45
in for our next one please introduce yourself for the record and who you're with sir I'm Brian McMillan
Speaker 201
1:01:51
I'm a project engineer from George Contracting I'm gonna kind of give you a real life scenario this is what project we have now to kind of detail our frustration with use utility delays we've got a project in Arcadelfia it's Arcadelfia bypass
the last utility was supposed to be moved in December of '23. We're probably four maybe five months out from having all the utilities relocated on that job and I'm trying to keep myself optimistic that that's actually going to happen. This is delayed work that was available to us should have been available to us last year. We have monthly utility meetings since the start. For the most part,
everybody shows up. For the last three months, we've asked a utility to move some existing lines off a pole. And they say, yeah, we'll have a crew there Monday. My fault was not saying, which Monday are you talking about? Because I have not shown up yet. And this, again, it's just delaying something and the only power that we have and RDOT has is to beg and plead please show up. That's all we have. So really this bill is just
making the utilities responsible for what they say they'll do when they say they'll do it. So I very much support this bill. Thank
Speaker 203
1:03:18
you Senator Bryant for sponsoring this and hope you consider it. Thank you.
Speaker 205
1:03:30
Any questions for the committee? Okay, well, I'm going to ask you, what
Speaker 203
1:03:35
utility was it? Well, there's several. We're going to name them, let's name them.
Speaker 201
1:03:40
I've got Optimum, Arcadelfry Water and Sewer, Ritter, AT&T, I think Summit's out of the way.
They did good on their job. Is this all in the one project you were talking about? Yes, sir. Intergy, again, they've got to remove their old poles, but they've got to get the lines that are on the poles off first. Then they can remove their own poles. So there are several that are
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:04:03
still in a way. But if you're still having any problems, they're probably out here in the audience. You can maybe get that taken care of.
Speaker 205
1:04:12
I'll wait until we get outside. Thank you, sir. And so you said that these utilities were supposed to be moved when?
Speaker 203
1:04:19
The last, you know, there's some schedules before, that the last utility was supposed to be out of the way in December of '23. So we're--
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:04:39
- We're about a year and a half now. - All right, thank you. - Any other questions? - Let
me verify this 'cause Senator Scott, so you're saying that in your, because I know you say you meet monthly, right?
You meet monthly as far as, And so you've been, you know, once you got the job, you've been talking to utilities, you meet monthly for a utility meeting. And
then they continuously, I mean, this December, man, that's like 15 months right now. 12, 15, yeah, 76. So we're talking about within the last 16 months, you've been discussing the movement of the utilities,
and this is still not complete.
They still haven't done. okay all right thank you any other
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:05:24
questions seeing none thank you sir mr john bethel
please state your name and who you're with for the record
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
1:05:51
Good evening Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, I'm John Bethel with Intergy Arkansas and I will echo the comments of the other utilities before me. First of all, thank Senator Bryant for he has worked with us on a lot of this and we are down to just a couple of issues, but those are significant issues that we think are important. The withholding of permits is an excessive penalty. we believe there is a penalty provision that has a civil sanction and we think that is a reasonable part of the process that if if you go through the entire
process and you still are out of compliance a civil sanction seems to be reasonable a holding of a permit in another area for an unrelated project prevents work being done that customers need both for reliability and extending service and other reasons and it doesn't seem an appropriate penalty provision to do that the civil sanction does seem to be the more appropriate fit and the other is the timing of when that clock starts and the acquisition of right-of-way
is more often than not the problem we see is we have to wait for the department to identify what right-of-way they're going to have and then if the department changes the scope of the project if their right-of-way moves we have to then move our right-of-way during the project which causes a delay And we have to work with different landowners or the same landowner to get different property to place our facilities because our rights-of-way generally run parallel to the department's rights-of-way. And so as they expand, we expand.
And as the others said, oftentimes the landowner wants to deal with RDOT first and then with us. And that can cause a disconnect in the schedule. And so that provision, we think, is important also is to time the enforcement schedule to that and with that, I think you've heard the issues that are of concern to us and I'll take
questions if you have any. Any questions for Mr. Bethel? Seeing none,
Speaker 112
1:07:53
thank you, sir. Thank you. Mr. Don Weaver.
Representative Rick Beck
Unverified
1:08:13
I'm Don Weaver, President of Weaver Valley Contractors in Conway, and I'm going to talk about a project y'all are probably all familiar with, the Jacksonville new I-57 project in Jacksonville. We started that project, notice to proceed, well, the pre-construction was on February the 23rd of '23. At that meeting, there were 11 utilities on this job.
Seven broadband companies, energy, water and sewer. The Air Force Base had some really critical infrastructure that we couldn't mess with. All of them said they would be completely finished by the 31st of the next month. We're still having utility, refining utilities now. And not that they weren't relocated, they were relocated wrong. Particularly the
broadbands. When you're dealing with seven different broadband, you know, first off, they can't get out there and just blow and go because they've all got to be in somewhere. The job's two and a half miles long and there's 10 miles of drainage pipe. So you can imagine how many times we went across water, sewer, gas. We did have a problem with the gas a time or two, and it's mainly with the depth. It was relocated. It just wasn't deep enough because like right beside Walmart,
we lowered that road 13 foot, and that's a massive cut for the water, the sewer, and Walmart. And then the utility companies, you know, we have to, like they said, we have to go off the schedule the highway department gives us. So it's not only impacting us, it's impacting y'all. Y'all driving through the job every day. Because we're finding something, so we're having to move and close down. You may think you've got a familiar pattern through there, and all of a sudden the road goes this way or it goes that way.
And so it impacts the traveling public as much as anything. Trying to get in Walmart at Jacksonville. My God, we changed that ten times. So just the sheer number of utilities on an urban job is just mind-blowing. Thank you, Mr. Weaver. Any questions
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:10:36
for Mr. Weaver? Senator Desmayne. So you mentioned most of
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
1:10:40
your problems on that particular job had to do with broadband companies. I mean, and then, and I think when I hear and I've heard other people talk, you know, it's a local water, you know, water entity or utility that they maybe have a stronger problem with.
Is that mostly what you all see? Are some of the smaller utilities having a harder time? Or is it pretty much, I mean, is Center Point, I'm sorry, Summit and Energy and
AT&T and some of the bigger players? We had no
Representative Rick Beck
Unverified
1:11:09
problem at all with Energy. They were out of the way. We've had maybe one overhead that we've had to wait, but it's
not been a problem. The Summit has just strictly been a depth problem. We knew where the pipe was. It just wasn't as deep. The broadband, what their problem is, they contract out there to God knows who to come
and relocate it, and you've got seven broadband companies out there, and they've got seven contractors, and then all of a sudden they've got two or three subs that come out, and it just, you know, you can't, and they don't give them proper supervision, they don't send anybody out there with them, so MCI or Comcast, any of those guys, their contractor, it's up to them to try to figure out where to relocate the line so either us or the resident engineer ends up being their overseer and uh it's hardly ever at the proper depth it's uh it's just when
you have seven of them it's that's incredibly
Speaker 102
1:12:05
helpful i think for the discussion that we're having yes very much so thank you and like
Representative Rick Beck
Unverified
1:12:10
i said just the traveling public that we because we don't know where we're going to be sometimes the next day because we have to move
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:12:21
because we encounter one of these right any other questions so so that particular example that area that two-mile stretch of road as you encounter those problems what avenues do you have to take to get action so you can proceed with your job
Representative Rick Beck
Unverified
1:12:36
luckily there was enough drainage pipe you know we had like four crews laying pipe and when you just have to move find a place that where there wasn't a conflict and this job allowed us to move but still it's disrupting the whole flow of the job and not doing it in proper sequence and you're maybe laying a drainage pipe to nowhere to where there's no outlet for it and if it happens to rain you flood people so it can cause major problems
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:13:09
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Weaver, I'm looking at kind of all the players on
this chess board. There's you contractors, there's the customer, the utility, the RDOT, in some cases a city or county entity, road, whatever. And then, of course, the public utilities, energy and the broadband and the water and all that. But all of those, except for you guys, have eminent domain, do you not?
Well, my point being, they all can condemn the property to get what they need. Now, it might be some fight over how much the value to the landowner is, but they have the authority to do that and the contractor
does not. Am I following that correctly? I think
Representative Rick Beck
Unverified
1:14:02
that's correct. The highway department has always been really good about a utility that's going to serve a purpose that benefits the community to let them put their utility in their right-of-way. Along with that, if they widen that, it's up to the utility to move
and usually still within the newly acquired right-of-way. But the problem is just through here there are just so many businesses and so little area to put them in, they were on top of each other. Yes, sir. I'm
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:14:31
not just asking about 57. I'm talking about in general. Yeah. Yeah, we
Representative Rick Beck
Unverified
1:14:35
cannot take anybody's property. No, we cannot do anything like that. Exactly. So you guys
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:14:40
are kind of, like I said, you're getting buffing around in the
Speaker 228
1:14:43
middle. Whatever they tell us. Thank you, Don.
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:14:47
Thank you, Mr. Weaver. And we have Lisa Lake. Please introduce yourself for the record and who you're with.
Speaker 232
1:15:21
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Lisa Lake with AT&T. We appreciate the opportunity to speak here today. We appreciate what Senator Bryan has done and RDOT. You know, as they mentioned earlier, we met back in December. We voiced some concerns back then. So, you know, there's been some things I think that were addressed from that. But I'll just echo what the others have said
about some of the major sticking points here are the ability for them to withhold permits in a totally separate part of the state on a totally different job. And, you know, we've had broadband. I think Senator Dismang mentioned earlier, you know, all the broadband projects that we have. So, you know, we just don't understand why if we need a permit up in Jonesboro to deploy broadband, but we were having an issue with a job in another part of the state that it would make any sense to withhold that permit. Also, I know AT&T was mentioned
a while ago on a job along with several other utilities that haven't relocated. I'm not familiar with that job but I do know that a lot of times we're not able to move our facilities until some of the other utilities have completed theirs. so even if we have thought up front well we'll be able to move our facilities in a specific amount of time it's dependent on others getting you know theirs moved and out of the way before we can do that also so a lot of times you know if these schedules are going to be tried to
established up front you know we might have some idea of how long something would take but at the very beginning when we're given a project you know we've not done any preliminary work we don't know what customers that we might have to relocate off of those facilities you know a lot of times there's third parties in our duct systems customers like government entities hospitals and we have to do scheduled cutovers with them so any questions
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:17:35
Senator Love. So, thank you, Mr. Trenton. So, Lisa, I'm listening, and I failed to ask this question to the other utilities. So, I hear you all talk about the sticking point, really, with the permits and withholding permits. I guess I'm still kind of at a loss as to what would bring the utilities.
Say we took out those sticking permits. I mean, this is
Joshua Ryan's vehicle. All right. Are you saying the civil penalty is strong enough to actually make a utility move? I mean, I'm trying to get to a place where we can also go have dinner, but, I mean, what would make the utility really move? I mean, because if this wasn't an issue, it wouldn't be before us.
So I'm trying to get to kind of your thoughts about that. If not the withholding of the permits to kind of get
some expediency done, what would you say? Well, you know, when
Speaker 232
1:19:02
I spoke with my network director, I mean, that was, I think, the permit withholding is the major thing with him. So, you know, we've had a good working relationship with RDOT, and I understand, I think, as Mr. Bowen mentioned,
You know, we anticipate that we would be able to tell RDOT, well, you know, we can't get our work done because of this or, you know, some other reason. There's another utility that hasn't finished their work yet or we have some major customers that are in those lines and we're going to have to do some special scheduling to do those moves like in the middle of the night so you don't take down a hospital and things like that.
So, I mean, I think we could work with them, but the withholding of the permits and not always knowing up front the exact date that we can get something completed is problematic. Now, if we can go back and say, well, we can't get this completed by date X that we thought we could agree to and we can work through that, you know, that's understandable. But it kind of goes back to the very beginning when we felt like there really wasn't a need for this legislation.
You know, they have put the coordinators in place and we feel like we've always worked well with them and it's just bothersome to us when you're actually putting in a statute about withholding permits.
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:20:34
Okay, so now you heard, I think there was, the person from Arkadelphia mentioned that
they had a job that's probably been 16 months or so in the AT&T was one of the one of the utilities that had not there was yet to
move yes so I'm thinking somebody is probably gonna hear about that when you get when you get out
of the committee but I mean do you think that
Speaker 232
1:21:03
that's an acceptable time okay so no I wouldn't think 16 months is an acceptable time I'm not familiar with that job personally so I will ask our folks about it. If I were to guess what might have happened there, we weren't the only utility, they listed several, and my thought is probably that there's someone
else that's got to move and finish their completion, that there's something else that's probably holding us up from being able to do our work. That's my I guess, I mean that's my hope. I've not been made aware of anything from RDOT, from my network director, or anything like that, that AT&T is totally holding up a job in Philadelphia. - All right, thank you. - Thank you,
Speaker 178
1:21:49
Mr. Sharon. - Seeing no other questions, thank you, Ms. Lake.
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:21:54
- Thank you. - Speaking for Dennis Gullett.
Dennis Slett
Unverified
1:22:19
And then there were two. Good evening. My name is Dennis Collette. I'm the vice president of highway construction for Redstone Construction.
We're based here in Little Rock. I just wanted to talk specifically, well, first and foremost, for the bill. Like it
Speaker 249
1:22:33
provides accountability, it gives us better timelines that we can work for and through throughout the job from when it's bid to completion. Job specifically, probably I'll know about, we were the contractor on, was Highway 5 in Saline County. And that job went from Reynolds Road to Alcoa Road. And so we bid that job. Part of the timeline on that job, or part of the specifications, is we actually have to bid the number of days.
So the highway department associates a value with that day. We have to bid not only the cost to do it, but the time to do it. And so the total of those two dollar amounts is actually who gets the job. So, you actually could be higher, but could do the job quicker, and you can get the job. That way, there's less impact to the traveling public. The job gets done a little bit faster. It's an A plus C method bidding. It's what the highway department uses. Well, that job was a bid in January of 2018.
We bid 750 days. It should have finished July of 2020. It finished in 2023. three. It took like three extra years to complete it. And so there was several factors early on. Excuse me. The dates that were given in the contract, I think Mr. Hill spoke of earlier, those dates were missed. We waited the full amount of time we could before our contract time started, and there were still utilities being relocated. And throughout the course
of the job. There was utilities that were delayed and being relocated or needed to be relocated like Mr. Weaver spoke about. There was gas lines that weren't deep enough that were in the way of the pipe and different items. So, whoops. Any questions from the committee? We'll
Speaker 223
1:24:26
start Senator Love first. I'm sorry. Okay, okay. Go
Speaker 14
1:24:32
ahead, Senator Desmayne. Hi, and so just kind
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
1:24:35
of the same question. So what were the utilities that you were having issues with that drug it out that much longer?
Speaker 249
1:24:42
I think everybody on that one was guilty. It was AT&T, there was energy, there was local broadbands, there was the city of Bryant. Was there anything unique about that job that would cause it to be
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
1:24:53
that way if every utility is? I think a lot
Dennis Slett
Unverified
1:24:56
of times your urban projects are probably a bit harder because you get less right away. It seems like the job in the rural areas where the state has more right away. We
Speaker 249
1:25:06
have a job going on in Highway 270 in Whitehall. The job is five and a half miles long. Within the same time frame, we've already built two miles, but the road is a little bit more rural.
There's more room for utilities. We've still run into utilities. I've got an ongoing broadband delay in that job right now. That was supposed to be, we discovered it in October, it was supposed to be removed and the line out of our way by January 31st and it's supposed to be relocated tonight, you know, if that gives you an idea. All right, thank you.
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:25:39
So would you say a large part of that
would be from the growth in Benton area versus the Whitehall? What's that, sir? The growth in the Benton area
Speaker 257
1:25:48
versus the Whitehall area? Well, the project in Whitehall also encompasses down to 365.
Dennis Slett
Unverified
1:25:53
So once you get 530 to the other side where it ties into Highway 365, that area is pretty grown up, too. We need to go through the Lake Jefferson Parkway. That
Speaker 249
1:26:04
area is pretty grown up, too. It's a lot of businesses in the
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:26:13
Love. Yes, sorry. No, that's good there. It speaks off, so, too. So let me ask, so, you know, when you bid the project and you bid the days, you haven't, you all haven't gone to the utilities as of that, at that time, have you?
Speaker 249
1:26:30
No, at that point, the highway department's done that preliminary work, and they were given dates back that the utility should be relocated, and then they should be relocated to the edge of the
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:26:44
right-of-way and at a specific date. So who gives that time frame so that you can complete your bid?
Speaker 247
1:26:52
We're given a table and a special provision that tells us when those utilities are going to be out of the way.
Speaker 263
1:27:00
So who provides that table? The highway
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:27:03
department does. The highway department provides that table? Yep. Okay, so then we need to find out if the highway department gets the table from the utilities to ensure that that kind of jives with everything, because I guess we're just trying to figure out
Dennis Slett
Unverified
1:27:21
if... I think the loop is they're getting those time frames. Sorry. No, no, go ahead. Go ahead. It's just that
Speaker 249
1:27:27
those dates aren't met in a lot of situations.
They're just, and there's no follow-up or timely follow-up. And if they're not met, then there's no accountability. Okay, yeah,
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:27:38
we just need to find out who's given the
time frame dates or that schedule so that we can figure out what is what. Okay, thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:27:50
you, sir. Thank you. Appreciate your time. Thank you. And last
we have Sarah Tacker and Chandra Hunter.
please introduce yourself for the records and I am going to limit y'all to two minutes not four since it's two of you I thought y'all
Sarah Tacker
Unverified
1:28:39
trying to skirt the system here How's that? Excellent. I don't want to rehash anything that other utilities have said,
but there's two critical items I'd like to bring to your attention. The first is I'd like you to consider the implications on economic development of withholding permits. Often permits in other areas are for customer reliability and in many circumstances they are for an extension of services to other customers. SWEPCO is located in northwest Arkansas. The area is booming and withholding of permits, which is the section that SWEPCO objects to, is going to impact those economic development
issues. The other issue I'd like you to be aware of is that the literature on this topic indicates that utility incentives are much more effective than utility disincentives, such as withholding of permits and penalties. The incentives are already built into this bill, promoting communication, having a very detailed relocation agreement, and making sure that all of the parties are able to communicate with each other. What SWEPCO would like to see is lines 12 through 14 of page 5
removed, and then they would be able to support this bill. I'm happy to answer any questions. Yes, sir. Page 5. Now, let me caveat. We have not seen the amendment. So as the bill was filed this morning, page 5, lines 12 through 14, is the section on withholding permits. That is the critical fatal flaw for SWEPCO. If that element could be removed, then we think that certainly
this bill promotes items that are in the public interest. And so SWEPCO supports the overall paradigm, and that's really the only sticking point. Ms. Hunter, would you like to add anything real fast? No, I think she
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:30:39
covered all the more points. I appreciate the way you did that. You actually went to the bill and named what you don't like. Lines 12 through
Sarah Tacker
Unverified
1:30:50
14, page 5. Thank you so much. Any questions, committee?
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:30:57
Say none. Thank you. Thank you. Senator Bryant, you're
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:31:14
free to close. And you have two minutes. Mr. Chair, thank you, Vinny. I think I hope I teed that up correctly. Page 5, lines 12 through 14, which is the permit. Just to address a few of the concerns of utilities,
I think the bill contemplates a lot of what they're asking for. When does our right-of-way start? Well, part of that process is RDOT identifies when their right-of-way acquisition ends. Therefore, the timelines are built in to when do you tell me, utility, you can accommodate this based on what I'm telling you. And if RDOT can't accommodate that, then obviously there is a flaw in the timeline, and that's not on the utility. Therefore, there is no penalty to be assessed. I also, I think it, you know, it addresses change of plans, the 30, 60, 90.
and then something happens and they encounter an issue in the actual design as the contractors let that this doesn't work. The bill contemplates all the issues that they have concerns with about timelines and right-of-way acquisition. But the main thing is, at the end of the day, the reason, and I enjoyed working with any utility that came to the table, I think it was very beneficial because overall the bill is very beneficial to the public
and it provides things on paper that are generally not provided currently other than it works when it works and it doesn't when it doesn't. But at the end of the day, the reason I wanted to have this conversation with the committee is, you know, hey, you can keep the civil penalty in and just raise it. Well, that's, if you're fine with paying $500 and you're fine with paying $1,000, That means you're fine with just letting things go on status quo. So I felt it was necessary to have the conversation prior to any amendments about what does get their attention,
what brings them to the table, because at the end of the day, somebody is holding the ball. If utility A can't remove because utility B and RDOT receives that information, they go to utility B. Utility B says, I can't move until utility C. They go and have that conversation. It's not utility B's fault. Eventually, the buck stops. And then it's, hey, we're going to assess a $500 penalty and it's going to go into a pot of money of which you're drawing from the well of because that's how the system is set up. So my concern is unless we have the ability
for the accountability with some teeth in a bill, there really is no action to be taken except for let the status quo happen. And so that's my intent to have this conversation. I think it's important. I also think, you know, a hold on a permit is not a forever hold. It's get your ducks in a row, come back to the table, and once you've shown that's what you're going to do, I'm going to, in good faith, let your permit over at this other job. And so I think to me it is the appropriate balance in a world that I live in
that if a contractor that is in good faith working towards a goal is getting penalized and losing money, that's the taxpayer's money we're losing based on, as evidence from the testimony of the contractors that deal with these daily situations, they have to have an avenue for RDOT to hold accountability to the utility. Not to penalize them, just to bring them back to the table. And I think that accomplishes that. Nobody, outside of just removing it,
the other option was letting litigation play out between the aggrieved of the contractor and the utility not doing what RDOT said they'd do based on what the utility told RDOT they'd do. Back to your question, Senator Love. They got that timeline from the utility. And then the bill contemplates they're going to get that timeline from the utility. So they have every avenue to meet that timeline because it's their timeline. If they don't, right now there's no accountability. We wait three years for the public and the taxpayer. So I'm going to close for the bill.
I'm going to make a motion to do pass with discussion because I would love the feedback of the
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:35:18
bill, which you heard here in testimony. Okay, we have a motion do pass as amended. As amended. Do we have a second? We have a second
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
1:35:31
by Senator Johnson. Discussion? Senator Dismaine. So, I mean, my concern is, and if I'm listening to even some of the contractors and their issues that they're having, they're one-offs. This isn't, I mean, it's a water utility that's only in one part of the state, and there's not going to be anything to withhold on some other permit
in some other part of the state. There's broadband entities that in the way that we set that up, they're only working in specified areas. And so you're not going to withhold a permit on them in some other part of the state and have a ton of leverage. And it's those entities that we heard over and over again. It wasn't, I mean, I'm not saying there's not issues with an energy or an AT&T or a summit or whoever, but that's not what we were hearing about predominantly. It was about smaller entities that maybe, for whatever reason, were having a more difficult time.
is I'm not even sure that that provision captures some of the biggest problems. Then the penalties would go into place, and I don't care who you are, I think $500 a day and $15,000 a month is not an insignificant amount of money that they could be penalized for not moving forward. The one thing that I think this bill does that is very, very beneficial is sets up a process that does not exist. And one of the things we found when we looked at our ballot a few years ago is there were not processes in place for lots and lots of things that they did,
that they operated in silos, and so you had, you know, I don't know if you call them engineers or directors or whatever, doing certain things in one area in the state very, very well, not communicating with anyone else in the rest of the state the things that they were doing well so it could be replicated. And so I think, and I mean, even to the point, we just now hired someone for the first time to be the liaison between RDOT, the contractors, and the utilities. I mean, that's the way that it was four new positions is the way that I understood it,
which is also incredibly beneficial, but none of those things have played out. Again, I think you're getting a ton of what you want if we could remove that language, because it sounds like to me, and even in the contractor's discussion, it's understood that if you're operating in a highly urban area with lots of density, it's a much more difficult situation to move the utilities than if you're operating in an urban area or a rural area without all the utilities to have to move with a smaller or wider right away.
So, again, that's the only, I mean, I like what we're doing. I like the fact that we're actually creating a process that did
not otherwise exist. I am a little bit reluctant based on the testimony that we've
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:38:05
heard on that 12 through 14 on page
5. And I think adding to that discussion, based on that scenario, if you have a company that is financially a behemoth, that is not a... Senator
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:38:18
Bratton, are you discussing this as a member or as the bill presented?
Speaker 278
1:38:22
Yes, as a member. Okay. Yeah. You want me back over there?
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:38:32
We need you over here then. I'll be glad to. I've already closed. I'm a
member now. Okay. Speaking as a member. I think what I contemplated was if you have a behemoth of an entity that's in 14 states that is, you know, a billion-dollar company, you're going to accept those fees and there's no other draw versus if you're a small rural company
and RDOT doesn't have the ability to, you know, hold permits, maybe that penalty is going to be enough to motivate you. So it's an either-or based on the circumstances of the job that's having the problems. So that was the contemplation of having a discussion and leaving it in there because it was obvious some behemoths were fine with more penalty and they'd eventually get there. But the eventually turns into, you know, there obviously is a point where it stops, but what is that?
What's acceptable to the general public
and the taxpayers at one month
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:39:29
or is it six months? Thank you, sir. Any more discussion, Senator Dees? Thank you,
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
1:39:36
Mr. Chair. Remember, no questions to Senator Bryant. Understood. I
think I echo some similar sentiments, Senator Dismaying, that I like the concept of trying to get a framework. I think on the denial of permits in an out-weighted maybe relationship is how I view it.
Maybe that's not correct, but when I know there's active litigation and lawsuits going on between utilities and RDOT in these really complex situations, and now this would, it feels like it's heavy-handed on the page 5, line 12, denial of permits. It doesn't feel imbalanced to me with unrelated projects. I think I'm leaning towards a no vote
because of that segment and not because of the, I think everything, the civil penalties fills in line, but denial, and especially denial of permits in unrelated projects. So I think those are the things that I'm trying to understand and contemplate in my mind. Thank you. - Thank you, sir. - Senator Jermaine. - To
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
1:40:50
your point, I mean, I'm also apprehensive punishing one part of the state that may be having a project go on with utility relocation because of another part of the state dragging its feet it may be
a municipality it may be the landowners in that area it's just there's I mean it does seem strange to me that we would give that authority to someone to say you know broadband in your area is not quite as important as us getting this job done over here when it may not be there's just a lot of latitude given and That's my
concern. - Thank you, sir. - Any more discussion? Senator. - Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
1:41:32
Remind my colleagues a couple of things. One, there's just one
RDOT. It's not like there's a lot of utilities, a lot of contractors and all this, but, and they're not just a state agency, they're an independent state agency. If we want to talk about repealing Amendment 42, then okay, well, that's maybe something that would change some of the things. But they have extraordinary powers because the people 70-something years ago decided we needed to do something to clean up
and make sure that we had the most efficient way to build highways in the state. And so when we, they do have extraordinary powers. And, you know, if it were another agency, Perhaps the things that Senator Dismang brought forth about the regular order due process and what's the appeal and all that would make sense, but they are a unique creature, as is Game and Fish. Everybody knows that. That doesn't mean they are totally unilateral
and can do anything they want to. We're still the people's elected representatives, but when it comes to acquisition of right-of-ways and things like this, and to get things moving on building the roads that we've traditionally and historically, constitutionally even, given them extraordinary powers. So I encourage people to look at this as major progress. Everyone seems to like a lot of the things in the bill, and I think along the way in the future we might find ourselves in a position to reconsider and tweak some of these things
as we do on so many other things. But I think it's important because we've seen these extraordinary delays. Like when something runs over a year, there's got to be some incentives and disincentives in the process to get these things off dead center. So I would encourage you as well. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator Disman. Just
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
1:43:29
one thing I'd say is you're exactly right. It's an incredibly powerful organization with a lot
of independents. But they're here today because this is not a piece of power that they have unless we authorize them to have it.
And so we need to be diligent in how we disperse and we allow them statutorily to have this level of authority. I mean, I just I have a hard time believing that everything else in this bill falls to the wayside without those three lines in place. You know, I mean, that it doesn't achieve a more beneficial outcome than what we have right now in the status quo, which is what you should be commended for in working through. And, you know, we would have the ability to come back.
And if this doesn't work and we don't see satisfaction in the process, then, okay, I mean, we have a discussion about what is the next trigger that we allow this powerful agency to have that is autonomous from us outside of when we're sitting here in this very moment. But anyway, that's. Thank you, Senator Dismay. And I've got to agree with
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:44:31
you on that. You know, we heard a lot of testimony today, far and against, but there was only one of them that came up here and said what their fix would be.
And that fix was what was mentioned by Senator Disman just then. It was line, I think, 14 through 16. Several other
ones threw some ideas out and stuff, and no one was specific as that was. And so, that being said, I'll probably be a no, if it's a tie. any
Speaker 210
1:45:09
more discussion Senator Love so I've listened to it and also being
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
1:45:14
a person that has been on a project like this that has actually had issues with a utility which will name will remain nameless so I'm not going to name any utilities but this is an actual issue and the only ones that end up paying for it are the people of Arkansas. The reason being is because concrete costs more, asphalt costs more, and different things like that.
However, after listening to all the testimony and also just weighing the withholding of the permits, I think that may be a step maybe too far. And I'm in support of this bill, but as it is with those three lines, I think we might need to go back to the drafting table.
Now, Senator Bryant, that is up to you. I'll be supportive of the bill, but I think that those three lines do hurt the bill, and I think it hurts our efforts because we need to make sure that this framework stays in place so that utility companies are held accountable and that the people of Arkansas are not paying for excessive time delays. Thank you. Thank you, Senator Love. The only two we have left,
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:46:43
Senator Scott, would you like to say anything?
Senator Jamie Scott
Unverified
1:46:48
Sure. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think I like the framework and the issue we're trying to address. I'm not going to act like I understand all the complexities of what's going on. Some of the issues and concerns I had early on, Senator Dismaine got out of some of the people that spoke. But I think it's a bit overreaching to me that, and a bit excessive, that you could impact my other potential constituents and taxpayers by limiting their projects. So I feel like there's going to be delays.
We're trying to address the issue with delays, and then you could potentially cause more delays. And so I don't see how we're solving a problem. I feel like it might be solving this problem, but you might be creating another problem for another group of constituents who have valid rights and concerns and are paying tax dollars as well. So that's my, that's me speaking. Senator Stone, you've
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:47:45
been awful quiet. I'm good. You're good? Okay.
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:47:48
Thank you, Senator. Mr. Chair, I can count.
That's even though I'm a Marine, I learned my counting skills. Would you like to show us? I
appreciate the committee showing up. I think this was an important bill, maybe not in the top ten of the session, but definitely one that's up there that obviously generated a lot of support and a lot of discussion. And so I appreciate every member showing up this late evening holding it for dinner. So I'm going to pull down the bill. No, sir. I'm going to amend the bill.
After all this. I'm going to amend the bill because I needed to have this discussion. Right. Yes, I agree. just to make sure for nothing else for my own sanity that we are pursuing the appropriate and just actions to address this issue. So I guess independently offline, I'll take you on one by one and ask if there's any other little tweaks that you may not have brought up for discussion, but I appreciate the committee. Appreciate you doing that and thank you. And I think this is a
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
1:48:45
good bill. I think it can do a lot of good things for the state of Arkansas. So appreciate you running
this and putting it together and hopefully you can get it back to us in a timely manner where we can senator johnson well we'll let him work on it for a day or so as long as we've been here tonight we're not going to today appreciate it and i
would like to say before we adjourn that uh for any of you contractors out here and utility companies if y'all don't know each other since you've been having some issues get each other's phone numbers if you would that being said we're adjourned
Agenda
CALL TO ORDER - Senator Ricky Hill
SPECIAL ORDER OF BUSINESS
SB492 J. Bryant TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE RELOCATION OF UTILITY FACILITIES; AND TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE ACQUISITION, CONDEMNATION, AND DISPOSITION OF REAL PROPERTY BY THE STATE HIGHWAY COMMISSION.
SB96 C. Penzo TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING DETACHMENT BY A REGIONAL AIRPORT AUTHORITY; AND TO REPEAL REGIONAL AIRPORT AUTHORITY DETACHMENT.
SB258 C. Penzo TO CREATE THE ARKANSAS DIGITAL RESPONSIBILITY, SAFETY, AND TRUST ACT.
REGULAR AGENDA
SB447 J. Petty TO REQUIRE PERMITTED COMMON CARRIERS TO SUBMIT REPORTS DETAILING SHIPMENTS OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES INTO THE STATE.
SB478 G. Stubblefield TO CREATE THE ARKANSAS DIESEL ENGINE FREEDOM ACT OF 2025; AND TO PROHIBIT STATE ENFORCEMENT OF FEDERAL REGULATION OF CERTAIN TYPES OF DIESEL ENGINES.
SB496 Caldwell TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING PERMITS FOR SPECIAL CARGOES; AND TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE ISSUANCE OF A PERMIT FOR SPECIAL CARGO TRANSPORTED BY A FARM MACHINERY EQUIPMENT HAULER.
SB540 M. Johnson TO LIMIT THE SUSPENSION OR REVOCATION OF A DRIVER'S LICENSE OR IMPOSITION OF RESTRICTIONS ON A DRIVER'S LICENSE OF A PERSON WHO HAS SUFFERED A SEIZURE.
SB541 G. Leding TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE TOWING OR STORAGE OF A VEHICLE, IMPLEMENT, OR PIECE OF MACHINERY; AND TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE RELEASE OF A VEHICLE THAT HAS BEEN TOWED OR STORED.
HB1666 S. Meeks TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE ARKANSAS SELF-FUNDED CYBER RESPONSE PROGRAM.
HB1606 Steimel TO ALLOW A LOCAL GOVERNMENT TO AUTHORIZE THE OPERATION OF A UTILITY TASK VEHICLE ON A DESIGNATED PUBLIC STREET OR HIGHWAY WITHIN THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT'S JURISDICTION SUBJECT TO CERTAIN REQUIREMENTS.
HB1688 Cavenaugh TO AMEND ARKANSAS LAW CONCERNING THE USE OF A DEALER'S EXTRA LICENSE PLATE.
DEFERRED BILLS
SB330 J. Scott TO AMEND THE CONTENTS OF THE WRITTEN DRIVER'S LICENSE TEST AND THE DRIVER'S INSTRUCTION MANUAL; AND TO ADD HAND SIGNALS USED BY BICYCLE OPERATORS TO THE WRITTEN DRIVER'S LICENSE TEST AND THE DRIVER'S INSTRUCTION MANUAL.
ADJOURNMENT
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — TRANSPORTATION, TECHNOLOGY & LEGISLATIVE AFFAIRS - SENATE, Mar 31, 2025 | Agenda | 2 | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
Speaker 31
Speaker 33
Speaker 36
Speaker 38
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
Speaker 61
Speaker 65
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
Speaker 92
Speaker 37
Speaker 94
Speaker 8
Linda Lamb
Unverified
Speaker 126
Speaker 128
Speaker 129
Speaker 130
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
Speaker 152
Speaker 158
Speaker 162
Speaker 167
Speaker 169
Speaker 173
Brian Bowen
Unverified
Speaker 186
Senator Jamie Scott
Unverified
Speaker 188
Speaker 200
Speaker 201
Speaker 203
Speaker 205
Speaker 112
Representative Rick Beck
Unverified
Speaker 102
Speaker 228
Speaker 232
Speaker 178
Dennis Slett
Unverified
Speaker 249
Speaker 223
Speaker 14
Speaker 257
Speaker 259
Speaker 247
Speaker 263
Sarah Tacker
Unverified
Speaker 278
Speaker 210