Potential deadlines for qualifying projects might include:

n Bids must be awarded to construction companies within 90 days of the bill becoming law.

n Work must begin within six months of the bill’s passage.

n Work must be completed by Nov. 15.

Everyone, however, is just speculating about the provisions until an actual bill is proposed, debated in Congress, passed and signed into law.

While Forsberg would argue for more leeway in the timetables, the tight deadlines would guarantee that the federal money is being converted soon into paychecks for construction workers and from there into the broader economy.

Moving fast
“One of the goals is to get the money working as soon as possible,” Morrow said. “It’s good for the construction industry, which has been hurting. It’s jobs that can’t be out-sourced.”

And it’s work that needs to be done, according to supporters of the idea, who insist that infrastructure investment won’t result in make-work jobs.

Gordon Regenscheid, the maintenance manager for the Mankato-based District 7 of the Minnesota Department of Transportation, said MnDOT has been falling behind on its to-do list for nearly 20 years.

“It’s definitely not make-work since we really hadn’t received any real raise in the gas tax — which most of our funding comes from — since 1988, prior to this year,” Regenscheid said.

One estimate had District 7, made up of 13 counties in south-central and southwestern Minnesota, receiving $14 million in road projects out of a stimulus bill. Regenscheid doesn’t doubt that the district would identify plenty of good projects for that much money.

Resurfacing on Interstate 90 could consume much of that amount in itself, but the district would aim instead to spread smaller projects around the district, sharing the economic benefits throughout the region, he said.

“It’s quite a stimulus,” Regenscheid said. “We could get quite a lot of work done.”

Much of the work would be highway resurfacing, replacement of guard-rails, building up sagging gravel shoulders, repairing bridges, fixing drainage problems and replacing aging culverts.

“It gets some work done that actually needs to be done,” he said.