WASHINGTON – More than $103 million in highway money – some of it OK’d by Congress nearly two decades ago – remains unspent in Indiana, according to an analysis of federal data.

The $103 million includes money for the Clinton Street bridge renovation, a Fort Wayne project that is on the verge of final approval. In 2005, Congress allocated more than $4 million for the project. Construction on the bridge will begin this summer, and the money will be spent.

The five-year delay is not unusual, according to the database compiled by the Sunlight Foundation, a watchdog organization that advocates for transparency in government affairs.

The group found that about $6.5 billion has been on ice in Transportation Department accounts after members of Congress went to bat for hometown favorites. They secured money – called earmarks – for road construction, sidewalk installations, bridge repairs and bus stations, but the projects were never completed. Some have never been launched.

Many are likely in some stage of planning or design, said Steve Fisher, a lobbyist who helps Hoosier clients get earmarks for highway projects.

In 2002, the Government Accountability Office estimated that a major new federally financed highway project typically takes nine to 19 years to complete. If the money Congress sets aside for a specific project is for construction, the drawdown wouldn’t begin for years after the allocation was made.

For instance, according to Sunlight Foundation’s database, 84 Hoosier projects that received money in 2005 have yet to spend a penny.

But, Fisher said, “2005 is not that long ago. You wouldn’t expect these projects” to have spent the money, he said.

If the federal allocation is for construction, such as in the Clinton Street bridge project, all the planning and designing has to be done before the construction money can be touched.

But in addition to the natural timeline for a major construction project, there are other reasons money might lie fallow.

Sometimes local opposition has delayed or upended a project. Sometimes a project turns out to be ineligible for the money.

Sometimes, Indiana Transportation Department spokesman Will Wingfield said, it turns out the project isn’t needed.

For instance, he said, Congress set aside $2.4 million in 1998 to build a bypass around Greenfield on Indiana 9 in Hancock County, just east of Indianapolis. But after studying traffic patterns, Winfield said, “we quickly realized the majority of the traffic was visiting a destination in downtown Greenfield.”

So the bypass wasn’t needed.

Projects also sometimes fall by the wayside when a new mayor or county administration is elected, he said, and the new officials have a different set of transportation priorities. Sometimes it’s because there’s a requirement for local matching money and the city or county doesn’t have the cash.

These days, most congressional offices insist that the city or county officials who have asked for the earmark have local support – and the local match – lined up. But that didn’t happen years ago, Fisher said, drawing on his experience as a staffer in the offices of Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and former Sen. Dan Quayle, R-Ind.

When local officials found out they would have to come up with 20 percent of the project’s cost, he said, sometimes the project died because that money didn’t exist.

The lawmaker-sought projects were approved and financed in massive transportation bills signed into law in 1991, 1998 and 2005. The Sunlight Foundation says 90 Hoosier projects that received money in those bills have spent little or none of it.

Rep. Betsy Markey, D-Colo., introduced a bill this month that would redirect about $718 million of the unspent $6.5 billion by revoking any money not spent after 10 years.

“Long-term economic growth and recovery can’t happen unless we cut wasteful government spending and tackle our exploding deficit,” she said. “These old earmarks are a waste of taxpayer money, and cutting them just makes sense.”

Her bill to revoke $718 million in old earmarks is unlikely to pass this year because Congress will be in Washington a limited time before the end of the year. But she has the support of the key congressional player on transportation issues.

“At a time of rising federal budget deficits and economic hardship, it makes no sense to keep these unspent funds on the books,” said Rep. James Oberstar, chairman of the Transportation Committee.

Markey’s bill would:

•Revoke any unspent money for any project approved in 1991. According to Sunlight Foundation’s database, three Gary-area projects have used less than 10 percent of the money they were allocated 19 years ago. Nationwide, there are 151 other projects that have not tapped the money Congress approved, and Markey estimated $263.5 million would be recouped.

•Revoke unspent money allocated in 1998 if the projects haven’t spent at least 10 percent of what Congress approved. Three projects in Indiana – repairs to U.S. 31 in Columbus, the Greenfield bypass and an interchange improvement in Fishers – are on the list with 149 others throughout the U.S. Markey said $441.5 million would be taken back.

•Revoke an additional $13 million set aside for three other projects that have not been started or completed; none is in Indiana.

Markey does not propose to revoke any money set aside in the 2005 legislation even if nothing has been spent on a project.

sylviasmith@jg.net