(Radio Iowa) – The State Transportation Commission discussed then approved a settlement with the city of North Liberty over a road grant that didn’t produce the jobs it promised. The D-O-T’s Deb Arp says the RISE grant was for three million dollars to construct a roadway and roundabout. “And this was contingent on the creation of 307 new jobs at an expanded GEICO national auto insurance claims processing processing facility within three years of project completion,” she says. The roadway opened, but the company did not add any new jobs. “Based on the RISE project settlement policy the city has agreed to a repayment of one-million-77-thousand-368 dollars,” Arp says.

This RISE grant was based on an immediate opportunity to help a business, but the grants can also be based on the potential of the roadway to open up an area for more development. Arp says the potential to help businesses in the future was considered in the North Liberty repayment. “There is still a lot of area that could develop ,so that roadway regardless of whether those jobs were created or not is still there and may assist development in the future,” Arp says. “So that’s why we kind of give them a credit.” Commission chair Sally Stutsman questioned why there weren’t any new jobs created. She says she doesn’t want to see that become something that happens with these grants. “It comes across to me as a way to get a road built to a business with no guarantees that that business is going to produce jobs. It just doesn’t sit well with me, I’m sorry,” Stutsman says.

Arp says each request undergoes a scoring process, but they sometimes do not end up producing the jobs they were expected to produce. “We’re assisting the city and the county who are doing you know I believe their their very best to to work with these local companies. You know sometimes things just don’t materialize. Did the city proceed in good faith? I think in most cases we think they do,” she says. She says the area where the roadway section was built has a lot of future potential to help with business expansion.

The settlement was approved at the Commission meeting Tuesday.