Illinois Tollway Executive Director Kristi Lafleur touted her agency’s efforts to involve small-business contractors in its Move Illinois capital program during a Thursday City Club of Chicago address.
The $12 billion, 15-year program aims to ease congestion and create efficiencies across the Tollway’s 286 miles of roads. Improvements include the reconstruction and expansion of the Jane Addams Tollway (I-90) and the development of all-electronic tolling at the I-294/I-57 interchange and as part of the Elgin O’Hare Western Access project, according to the Tollway.
By breaking up the program’s work into smaller contracts, Lafleur said the Tollway has ensured “a greater shot at success for a greater number of people.” The Tollway to date has awarded more than 200 contracts to almost 600 different contractors under the program. Two-hundred-and-fifty of those contractors are working with the agency for the first time.
Lafleur said the decision to break the Tollway’s contract work into smaller pieces resulted in more work for her agency, but it was well worth the trouble. In total, Move Illinois is projected to create up to 120,000 full-time jobs and generate $21 billion for the local economy.
“We could have chosen a simpler path forward by packaging our roadway improvement contracts into big, hundred-million dollar contract packages; all of them packaged the exact same way. It would have been easier for us, that’s for sure,” Lafleur said. “How many of you in the room are familiar with the government procurement process? How many of you would like to do it more times than fewer to get the same result? Not very many.”
-Tom Butala