27:1B-22.5 Annual Transportation Capital Program Approval Committee.

8. a. There is hereby established in but not of the Department of Transportation, a body corporate and politic, with corporate succession, to be known as the Annual Transportation Capital Program Approval Committee. For the purpose of complying with the provisions of Article V, Section IV, paragraph 1 of the New Jersey Constitution, the committee is hereby allocated within the Department of Transportation, but, notwithstanding that allocation, the committee shall be independent of any supervision or control by the department or by any body or officer thereof. The committee is hereby constituted as an instrumentality of the State exercising public and essential governmental functions, and the exercise by the committee of the powers conferred by P.L.2016, c.56 (C.27:1B-22.5 et al.) shall be deemed and held to be an essential governmental function of the State.

b. (1) The committee shall be comprised of four members. One member shall be the Commissioner of Transportation, or the commissioner's designee, who shall serve ex-officio, and the remaining three members shall be public members, each of whom is to be appointed by the Governor upon the joint recommendation of the President of the Senate and Speaker of the General Assembly; one of whom shall be a resident of Salem, Cumberland, Cape May, Atlantic, Gloucester, Camden, Burlington, or Ocean county; one of whom shall be a resident of Monmouth, Mercer, Middlesex, Hunterdon, Somerset, or Union county; and one of whom shall be a resident of Warren, Sussex, Essex, Passaic, Morris, Hudson, or Bergen county. Each public member shall serve a term of three years, which shall run from August 1, of the year of appointment until July 31 of the third year following appointment. The Annual Transportation Capital Program Approval Committee shall be deemed to be constituted immediately upon appointment and qualification in the manner provided in this section of the three public members.

(2) The purpose of the committee is to ensure that Legislative input is provided in the process of selecting the transportation capital projects to be funded annually through the Transportation Trust Fund Account pursuant to section 20 of P.L.1984, c.73 (C.27:1B-20), and to prepare an Annual Transportation Capital Program Approval Certification.

(3) Commencing with the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2017, the board shall submit to the Governor and the Legislature on an annual basis the Annual Transportation Capital Program Approval Certification referencing therein a certification attested to by all members of the committee that for the proposed projects of both the Department of Transportation and the New Jersey Transit Corporation included in the Annual Transportation Capital Program, required pursuant to section 22 of P.L.1984, c.73 (C.27:1B-22) and the list of projects proposed by the department for inclusion in the State budget to be appropriated from the revenues and other funds of the New Jersey Transportation Trust Fund Authority: (a) the projects were developed with input from each member of the committee; (b) that every member of the committee has been granted access to all available information of the department concerning each project; and that (c) each member of the committee approves the inclusion of each project in the Annual Transportation Capital Program and recommends that the project be included in the list of projects to be appropriated from the revenues and other funds of the New Jersey Transportation Trust Fund Authority in the Annual Appropriations Act. The first annual certification required by this subsection shall be submitted to the Governor and the Legislature by March 1, 2017, after the certification has been approved by every member of the committee, and by March 1 of each year thereafter. The committee shall advise the authority on July 1, 2017 and on each succeeding July 1, if members of the committee have failed to unanimously approve the Annual Transportation Capital Program Approval Certification. If no Annual Transportation Capital Program Approval Certification has been approved for a fiscal year, the Legislature shall not make any appropriation from the revenues and other funds of the authority for the financing of transportation projects in that fiscal year until the certification has been unanimously approved. Prior to approval of the certification, appropriations shall only be made for existing projects and for debt service on authority bonds.

L.2016, c.56, s.8.