Thursday, July 6, 2006 — Despite controversy and questions, the Albemarle City Council decided Monday to continue membership in a governmental transportation planning organization.

The Albemarle City Council met Monday night with Mike Bruff, branch manager of transportation planning for the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT), discussed changes in the controlling body of the Rocky River Rural Planning Organization (RPO).

The RPO is a planning organization for future transportation project.

The Centralina Council of Governments (COG) was the lead agency for the RPO. According to Bruff, NCDOT was not satisfied with the performance of COG and entered into negotiations with Stanly County.

The Albemarle councilmembers said they were upset about the change from the Centralina COG to Stanly County.

The Rocky River RPO is made up of Stanly, Anson and Union counties.

Councilmember Martha Sue Hall said she supported RPOs.

“When you go to a Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP) meeting, it is better to have a unified voice,” she said. “You have one voice instead hundreds screaming.”

“I don’t want to get lost again.” Hall said talking about the planning sessions before RPOs were formed.

Councilmember T.E. White said Stanly County has waited 20 years with the construction of the I-485 loop around Charlotte.

“N.C. 24-27 is still on the TIP, the last portion was supposed to be bid in October,” White said, “but now it is set for March 2007.”

Bruff said funding problems exist across the whole state.

“DOT is in a significant cash crush,” Bruff said. “The role of the RPO is to coordinate and prioritize when funding is available.”

Bruff saidmany projects had been put off due to the money problems at NCDOT.

Councilmember Jack Neel said many projects - like ones in Mecklenburg County - have not been postponed.

“We had not been given notice that a change was going to be made on the lead agency for the RPO.”

Neel said.

“There was no warning and we don’t know why. Why were we not invited to participate?”

Neel said if Albemarle had known about the change, Bruff would not be at the meeting.

“I am not sure why Albemarle was left out,” Bruff said. “We have been in discussion for a whole year. Stanly County came to (NC)DOT with interest to do it.”

Bruff said the reason for the change is that Centralina COG had been put on probation due to its performance with the Rocky River RPO.

“This is the first I have heard that,” Neel said.

Bruff said the DOT dropped the ball with communications about the change.

White said this was also the first time he had heard of problems with Centralina COG.

Councilmember Troy Alexander asked Bruff who was going to hire the new director for the Rocky River RPO.

Bruff said Stanly County would do the hiring.

The RPO is funded 80 percent with a 20 percent match from the governments that participate.

Stanly County Commissioner Gary Lowder said the county started informal talks last fall about being the lead agency for the RPO.

“We started preliminary talks with people from Union and Anson counties,” Lowder said. “We were talking about the feasibility of someone other than COG, like one of the counties, last fall.”

Lowder said conversations with a representative from Raleigh were held to see how they felt.

According to Lowder, Union County made to motion to withdraw from the Centralina COG with Anson County seconding the motion. Eight members voted for the motion and three against.

“The county is supplying office space for the RPO,” Lowder said.

“Members of the RPO had a vote at the RPO meeting to make the change.”

Lowder said members of the RPO could not get answers on how money was spent in the organization and some member governments were not satisfied with results on grant application processes or assistance that the COG was supposed to give.

Stanly County Manager Jerry Myers confirmed the county started the hiring process about two weeks ago.