The picture isn’t any brighter, but at least our challenge is much more clear . . . 

That is the best you can probably say about the 2010 Annual Program Evaluation (APE).  This document, which RTD prepares annually for the Denver Regional Council of Governments, provides the most recent snapshot of the financial picture and technical adjustments to the FasTracks program. 

You can access a summary of the 2010 APE document at the following link: http://www.rtd-fastracks.com/media/uploads/main/1_5_10_APE_Presv_Final.pdf. 

Most critically, the new APE finds that costs for the entire FasTracks program have dropped $400,000, to a total of $6.5 billion.  This cost reduction is due primarily to lower material prices and more refined system designs. 

Unfortunately, sales tax revenue continues to drop, as well.  The new estimates for the life of the program fell another $1.3 billion.   The resulting gap between revenue and costs for the FasTracks program is about $2.4 billion, $200 million more then previous estimates.

What makes this year’s APE particularly noteworthy is the great effort RTD staff made to test its financial numbers.  Specifically, you may remember that I previously advocated for a new look at RTD’s sales tax projections.  Staff responded by recruiting groups of subject-matter experts, in both construction cost inflation and sales tax revenue modeling, to scrutinize RTD figures.  As a result, this year’s APE numbers reflect the input from some of the area’s best forecasting minds.

So, as you can see, we still have a difficult financial hurdle to overcome as we work toward build-out of the FasTracks system . . . but at least there is reason for greater confidence that this is the hurdle, as we now have much greater confidence in the financial picture for the full program.