CTC update: county reports improved road conditions but funding and state rules constrain priorities

Bluffton — Craig Gordon, who leads the county transportation committee work, briefed the Transportation Advisory Committee on March 4 about the history, funding rules and measurable results of the county'level CTC program.

Gordon traced the program's origins to postwar farm-to-market funding and a 1976 state statute (Section 12-28-274A of the South Carolina Code of Laws) that established CTCs and how they are governed. Beaufort County chose self-administration of its CTC funds rather than SC DOT administration, Gordon said.

To set priorities and measure outcomes, the county commissioned a pavement quality-index (PQI) road analysis and a rolling five-year program. "We had zero roads that were in the good or very good condition" in early reviews, Gordon said. After the plan and subsequent work, the county reported it reduced "very poor" miles from five miles down to 1.1 miles and achieved about 77 miles of roads rated good or very good in the latest review.

Gordon and staff summarized financing mechanics: the state gas-tax increase passed in 2018 was implemented in phases and the current state tax was cited around 28 cents per gallon; roughly 3'.99 cents of that is routed into the CTC pool and distributed among the 46 county CTCs. Beaufort County's share was described as roughly $2.66 million plus about $687,000 in donor fees, a combined pool of roughly $3.3 million per year that the county uses for resurfacing, county-road paving and a required 33% allocation to state routes.

Committee members pressed on how the 33% state-route requirement affects local priorities. Gordon said the county has deliberately used its 33% allocation to address low-ADT (000 and 500',000) neighborhood routes that the state would otherwise deprioritize, while the county's separate vehicle-registration tag fund (a $20 annual fee) helps fund a dirt-road paving program.

Why it matters: the CTC's technical, data-driven approach helped remove politics from local resurfacing decisions, Gordon and a committee member said, and has produced measurable improvements despite limited funds. Committee members discussed whether bonding a future penny-tax pot would accelerate larger corridor projects in the LATS plan.

Next steps: committee staff will collect municipal ranked priorities and combine them with corridor-level LATS studies and the county'level cost estimates to present a consolidated list to county council for policy decisions on bonding or referendum timing.