Public Works

The Senate voted Thursday to ask the Justice Department to investigate allegations of impropriety and possible criminal violations involving a $10-million Florida highway project slipped into a bill after Congress had approved it. The earmark, inserted two years ago into a five-year, $286-billion highway funding bill, was for a Coconut Road interchange project on Interstate 75 near Naples, Fla. But state and local officials never requested money for the interchange.

Inside Tom W. Bogard's office, maps are everywhere. They help the highway director for the Orange County Transportation Authority see the future -- or at least where the next caution signs for construction will be posted. Over the next five years, Bogard and his counterparts in neighboring counties will act as railroad yardmasters, coordinating projects to relieve congestion so they are spaced apart and done mostly at night, so commuters can avoid delays.

Piles of smelly, rotting trash dumped illegally in some of Los Angeles' poorest neighborhoods have been allowed to sit for weeks because dumping has increased: The number of complaints has doubled in the last year while sanitation staffing has remained stagnant, the city's top public works officials reported Monday.

It may be only half a penny, but from the looks of things on Friday, an effort to raise sales taxes in Los Angeles County to pay for a slew of mass transit projects and road improvements will probably be a heated contest this fall. On Thursday, the board of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority voted to put a half-cent sales tax hike on the Nov. 4 ballot.

Does Southern California need a dozen or so new gas-fired power plants -- and if it does, can it build them? No one seems to know for sure. The region's long-term plans to generate electricity to serve a growing population and to replace decades-old dirty plants were thrown into disarray this week, when a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday that local authorities had failed to do the necessary environmental and health analyses.

A year after the collapse of Minneapolis' Interstate 35W bridge, which killed 13 people and injured more than 100, the drive to improve the safety of the nation's bridges has faded amid waning public interest to fund such projects in a souring economy. "The push to repair bridges and our country's infrastructure has become a victim of the bad economy," said Pennsylvania Gov. Edward G. Rendell, a Democrat who, along with California GOP Gov.

Irvine officials have tapped Michael Ellzey, a recently hired deputy executive, to be promoted to top administrator of the Orange County Great Park. Ellzey was promoted Thursday during a closed-door meeting of an executive search committee. The decision has yet to be approved by the park's governing board.

A Los Angeles Police Department deputy chief vowed Monday to crack down on those who illegally dump refuse on public streets and alleys in South Los Angeles. Deputy Chief Kenneth O. Garner, who oversees the department's South Bureau, said that his officers would be launching a task force later this month with investigators from the city's Public Works Department.

Even in the world of big-ticket water projects, where delays, cost overruns and controversy are frequent, the inelegantly named Inland Feeder Project was in a class of its own. In its two decades, the project has faced fire, flood, regulatory disputes, difficult geology, grouting problems, earthquake considerations, a switch of contractors and more. At one point it was $100 million over budget.

Friday's federal bailout package will include several billion dollars in education and road funding for some of the nation's most remote communities, through programs aimed at helping areas with large swaths of untaxed federal land. The funding was among the sweeteners attached to the financial industry rescue bill passed by the House of Representatives on Friday and signed by President Bush.