Anchorage may have paid the state's traffic-signal power bill for 20 years

Anchorage's Traffic Engineering Department never tracked the actual cost of electricity powering state-owned traffic signals — a gap that makes it hard to tell whether the city has covered the state's share of the power bill for two decades. A city audit released Aug. 20 laid out the problem.

Under a 2005 agreement, the state pays Anchorage a fixed amount, adjusted annually by the consumer price index, to operate and maintain the signals. Management assumed that adjustment covered electricity. But the audit found the municipality "may have paid the utility (i.e. electricity) expenses that should have been paid by the State."

The city has been warned before. A similar finding on the same agreement appeared in an audit five years ago, and auditors again recommended that Traffic Engineering track its actual costs and compare them with what the state pays.

Management said Public Works, not Traffic Engineering, tracks the utility costs and payments, and that the data are "granular to the specific traffic signal." The report does not say auditors reviewed that data. Traffic Engineering will assess whether the state's payments cover its costs, then "initiate discussions with ADOT as needed."

Auditors said most of the city's transfer agreements were properly administered. The report goes to the Assembly on Sept. 1.