LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — More and more people are calling Nevada home.
According to records from the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles, between 2020 and 2023, 369,878 people moved to the Silver State.
With more people on our roads, the Nevada Department of Transportation is facing challenges keeping up with infrastructure demands.
On Tuesday, NDOT Director Tracy Larkin Thomason went over the agency's budget for the upcoming biennium, from 2025 to 2027, with the state Legislative Commission's Budget Subcommittee. She said the agency is trying to prioritize what projects should be worked on and it's an extensive list.
"Over [a] ten-year period, we're looking at about $22 billion in needs. It averages about $2.2 billion a year, if we're going to keep pace with the needs that have been identified," Larkin said. "We're basically doing about half the program we should be doing to keep up with our transportation program. Our average budget per year ranges, and this has been with grants, about $1 billion."
According to Larkin, NDOT takes care of about 5,400 center lanes of highway along with about 1,300 bridges across the state.
"We are only about 19% of the state highway system but we cover well over 50% of the traffic," she explained. "NDOT utilizes highway user fees and federal aid to fund approximately 99% of our operations."
While highway fund revenues have rebounded since pandemic lows in 2020, Larkin said they're not keeping pace with inflation.
Inflation has hit many aspects of NDOT's operations, including the price of materials used on construction projects.
"[From] the fourth quarter in 2020 to the fourth quarter in 2023, we had an average increase of about 68%. Most of that is in different types of asphalt, concrete, and steel," Larkin said. "Also, in labor. The labor costs have gone up and the availability of skilled labor although I will say that is evening off some."
It's also creating issues in terms of updating NDOT's fleet of vehicles, which Larkin said is 49th in the nation, in terms of the condition of the fleet.
"We just can't keep up with the rate of deterioration. We also have to point out just the cost of equipment. To purchase an F-150, just a pickup, in 2020 was just under $32,000. In 2024, we bought the same one for $55,000," Larkin said. "When we replace [vehicles], it's based on all of the things, miles or hours, depending on the type of equipment, age, and condition. We want to maximize the use that we get out of them. We have some plows that still go back many decades that ares still on the road."
She said most of the equipment being replaced this year is for heavy equipment. That includes things like stripers and loaders.
There are also other costs for services that you don't automatically think of when it comes to NDOT.
"When we talk about trash, homeless abatement, and theft, this used to be kind of ancillary to our program. We picked up trash. We dealt with it but it has grown over the last several years to kind of be a program in and of itself," Larkin said. "It's a little over, between $10 million to $11 million a year for trash and homeless abatement and there's about another $15 million in copper theft that we've been dealing with and getting extra security for throughout the state."
Larkin explained that NDOT is trying to be responsible with the public's money and they've been looking for ways to grow their federal grant program.
"Our federal grant program is now becoming over 60% of our [budget]. To relate that, back in 1999, it was 29% of our program. [In] 2009, it was 45%. And even as recently as 2024, it was 40% of our program," Larkin explained.
NDOT is also looking to add positions in-house that can cut down on extra costs. For example, hiring more people in NDOT's biology department, which oversees environmental programs.
"Since 2010, the Fish and Wildlife Service and Federal Highway Administration have required NDOT to directly provide desert tortoise construction monitoring in Southern Nevada to meet permit requirements and basically, the biology program has been severely understaffed for more than a decade," Larkin said. "We have relied heavily on consultants to provide the construction phase for the biology needs except it is very expensive and we're not really getting the level of service that we need from them ... Since 2011, we spend about $1 million annually paying the consultants."
She added that since 2018, NDOT is also getting more requests from federal agencies to better document construction mitigation performance measures.
As for the future, Larkin said NDOT is looking out for potential changes, which could come down now that President Donald Trump is in office.
"With the new change in administration at the federal level, there are executive orders coming out that we are watching very closely to see how it may or may not impact our programs," Larkin said. "I don't have have more information at this time. But as a side note, my motto is do not surprise you. I'd rather tell you a little something now and say I'll clear it up later. Hopefully, it's nothing."
