This past week, the Minority Conferences in the Assembly and Senate rallied with local highway superintendents and laborers to champion the cause of better funding for local roads and bridges. Known as the Consolidated Local Street and Highway Improvement Program (CHIPS), CHIPS is an integral means of funding the repair and maintenance of local roads that the state contributes to. Yet the reality often is that despite the exemplary work of our local town and county highway superintendents and their teams, the work they conduct is underfunded.

This year, our Conference specifically asked for an additional $200 million in CHIPS funding, plus an additional $70 million in Extreme Winter Recovery funding. These numbers may sound outrageous, but one must remember that with statewide budgets going as high as $220 billion, they’re a drop in the bucket. And these monies have tangible, real-world applicability as opposed to funding things like studies or investigative groups, whose work can often take years before we see results. This money will go toward employing the laborers who maintain the roads, to buying the equipment and material necessary to ensure their long-lasting durability and it accommodates the rising costs of inflation that has been burdening us all since 2022.

In most other contexts, I would tend to agree that more spending is not the solution. But roads and bridges, especially the local ones that dot our towns and villages, are the nervous system that connects us together. Without them, travel becomes hazardous. Worsening road conditions lead to unstable terrain, terrain that we use to drive to work every day, that our kids use to ride the bus to school. This problem is bigger than a price point, it’s a matter of safety and connectivity for the community. And it’s worth the investment.