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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 36 / Thursday, February 25, 2021 / Notices Criterion 3: Racial Equity and Barriers to Opportunity The Department encourages applicants to describe credible planning and actions to address potential inequities and barriers to equal opportunity in the project as reflected in Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government, and Section A.2.c of this NOFO.
The application will be assigned a Racial Equity and Barriers to Opportunity rating based on how it addresses racial equity and barriers to equal opportunity in 1 planning and policies and 2 project investments.
Applications that address both planning and policies and project investments will receive a high rating. Applications that address either planning and policies or project investment receive a medium rating. Applications that do not address racial equity and barriers to opportunity in either their sponsors planning and policies or project investment will receive a low rating.
In Racial Equity and Barriers to Opportunity 1: Planning and Policies, the application will be determined to have addressed this area if the INFRA
application incorporates any of the following, but these are not the only bases that the Department may use to determine an application addresses this area:
A racial equity impact analysis for the project;
Documentation of equity-focused community outreach and public engagement in the projects planning in underserved communities;
The projects sponsor has adopted an equity and inclusion program/plan or has otherwise instituted equity-focused policies related to project procurement, material sourcing, construction, inspection, or other activities designed to ensure racial equity in the overall project delivery and implementation.
In Racial Equity and Barriers to Opportunity 2: Project Investment, the Department will assess if the project investments either proactively address racial equity and barriers to opportunity or redress prior inequities and barriers to opportunity, and whether those investments are documented by previously incurred and/or future costs of the project. Examples of Racial Equity and Barriers to Opportunity Project Investment include, but are not limited to:
Project investments that improve or newly connect underserved communities to proactively address barriers to opportunity or redress past
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inequities and barriers to opportunity.
For example:
Physical-barrier-mitigating land bridges, caps, lids, linear parks, and multimodal mobility investments that are directly related to the project and either redress past barriers to opportunity or that proactively create new connections and opportunities for underserved communities;
New or improved walking, biking, and rolling access for the disabled to reverse the disproportional impacts of crashes on people of color, and mitigate neighborhood bifurcation; and New or improved freight access to underserved communities to increase access to goods and job opportunities for those underserved communities.
Project investments that directly partner with underserved communities to proactively address barriers to opportunity or redress past inequities and barriers to opportunity. For example:
Project sponsor partnerships with land banks or land trusts for equitable and fair transfer of excess right-of-way, and other properties directly related to the project;
Project sponsor partnerships with, or investments in, multimodal mobility providers to proactively address potential racial equity and barriers to opportunity or redress past inequities and barriers to opportunity directly related to the project;
Project that result in hiring from local communities.
Definitions for racial equity and underserved communities are found in Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government, Sections 2 a and b.
Criterion 4: Leveraging of Federal Funding To maximize the impact of INFRA
awards, the Department seeks to leverage INFRA funding with nonFederal contributions. To evaluate this criterion, the Department will assign a rating to each project based on how the calculated non-Federal share of the projects future eligible project costs compares with other projects proposed for INFRA funding. The Department will sort large and small project applications non-Federal leverage percentage from high to low, and the assigned ratings will be based on quintile: projects in the 80th percentile and above receive the highest rating; the 60th 79th percentile receive the second highest rating; 40th59th, the third highest; 20th39th, the fourth highest;
and 019th, the lowest rating.

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USDOT recognizes that applicants have varying abilities and resources to contribute non-Federal contributions.
To help applicants gauge competitiveness of proposed nonFederal contributions, the Department has published information about the non-Federal leverage proposed in applications from the prior INFRA
round at this link: https
www.transportation.gov/buildamerica/
financing/infra-grants/additionalresources.
This evaluation criterion is separate from the statutory cost share requirements for INFRA grants, which are described in Section C.2. Those statutory requirements establish the minimum permissible non-Federal share; they do not define a competitive INFRA project. For the purposes of evaluating leverage as a competitive selection criterion, the Department will consider the proceeds of Federal assistance under chapter 6 of Title 23, United States Code or sections 501
through 504 of the Railroad and Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act of 1976 Pub. L. 94210, as amended, to be part of the Federal share of project costs. Applications that require other discretionary funding from the Department to complete the projects funding package will be considered less competitive.
Criterion 5: Potential for Innovation The Department seeks to use the INFRA program to encourage innovation and be transformative in achieving program goals in three areas: 1 The accelerated deployment of innovative technology and expanded access to broadband; 2 use of innovative permitting, contracting, and other project delivery practices; and 3
innovative financing. The Department expects these innovations to contribute to the goals for the program established in 23 U.S.C. 117 a2 or align with one of the key objectives of 1
Supporting economic vitality, 5
Addressing climate change and environmental justice impacts, or 6
Advancing racial equity and reducing barriers to opportunity:
Improve the safety, efficiency and reliability of the movement of freight and people Generate national or regional economic benefits and an increase in the global economic competitiveness of the United States Reduce highway congestion and bottlenecks Improve connectivity between modes of transportation
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