BOISE, Idaho — Gas prices in Idaho continue to rise. AAA reported Sunday that the average price for a gallon of fuel in the Gem State is now $4.50, about 10 cents more compared to a month ago.
People around the state are all feeling the impacts of the rise in fuel costs, including state and county agencies.
"Even though the fuel prices are rising, our priority is the maintenance of the roads," said Ada County Highway District Deputy Director of Maintenance Jennifer Berenger. "We will adjust other parts of the budget to make sure that we have the necessary fuel to make sure that all of the planned projects and maintenance activities that we have scheduled will occur as expected."
ACHD's 2022 fiscal year budget was approved for $150,613,900 by the agency's Commissioners last August, where they also voted to collect $45,223,00 in revenue from property taxes.
Berenger said of the FY22 budget, the agency allotted $1.1 million to help fuel their more than 260 mobile vehicles.
"It's a very small percentage," Berenger said." As we have those fluctuations in the market, we're able to adapt from within the budget that we have."
The FY22 started in October of 2021. Berenger said so far ACHD has not exceeded its fuel budget, but if they do there are plans in place to help get the trucks out on the road and working on the projects.
"While we have a budget line specifically for fuel, we have other budget lines for various other equipment expenses, other materials. It is just general fluctuations in the market will show different responses," Berenger said. She added that ACHD may hold off on buying new equipment to help balance the budget.
While Berenger doesn't see ACHD overspending on the fuel budget, it's already a different story for Idaho State Police.
"Each year, our budget is set through the legislature. But the cost of what gas price has gone up significantly since the beginning of the year," said Captain Matt Sly with ISP.
According to ISP's finance specialist, the department is budgeted at $3.50 a gallon for fuel. ISP's patrol is budgeted at $720,000 for the FY22 (July 1, 2021 - June 30, 2022). This year through April, the state patrol team has already spent $867,000. The finance team anticipates another $200,000 in fuel expenses for patrol in May and June.
However, just because the state police department has already gone over budget, doesn't mean Idahoans will see fewer troopers on the road.
"It doesn't impact how we do things at the operations level because we still have to respond to crashes, and we still have to respond to the different services," Sly said.
ISP is using salary savings to cover unbudgeted fuel expenses and will ask lawmakers for additional funds next year to cover the rise in gas prices.
"We are still out there every day, you know, doing what's expected of us," Sly said.
Idaho Department of Transportation's more than 2,400 fleet vehicles across the state are also spending more at the pump in the FY22 than in previous years.
"This isn't the first time we've seen this happen. They have fluctuated before and gone up," said John Tomlinson, the communications manager for ITD. "We're still maintaining and we're doing everything that we need to do to make the roads safe here in Idaho."
Tomlinson said they budget for fuel by averaging the last five fiscal years, FY17-FY21.
For diesel, they budgeted $2.46 million dollars for FY22. Through April 2022, ITD has pumped up 906,000 gallons of diesel fuel, about 200,000 gallons less than the five-year average. However, they've already spent $2.76 million dollars in FY22, about $300,000 more than the average budget.
Filling up on unleaded gas is also over budget for ITD.
The department budgeted $1.06 million dollars for FY22. The five-year average of filling up unleaded for ITD is about 441,000 gallons. Through April, crews have pumped up 346,000 gallons of unleaded gas which has cost them $1.1 million.
ITD's fiscal year ends June 30.
"We do have some leniency, we have some strategies and opportunities where we can maybe not spend as much on certain areas within our budget," Tomlinson said.
With ITD already going over budget, Tomlinson assures that ITD will continue with its projects and daily operations.
"One thing that we do is build into our contracts with our construction projects so we have a fuel contingency," Tomlinson said. "If the fuel prices go up 20% more than when the project was started then we talk about a contingency plan. We try to give that assurance to our contractors when we're working on those construction projects."
Watch more Local News:
See the latest news from around the Treasure Valley and the Gem State in our YouTube playlist: