(605 ILCS 145/15) Sec. 15. Dig once. (a) The Department of Transportation, the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority, the Illinois Commerce Commission, and the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity shall consult with the State-Wide One-Call Notice System to jointly develop rules for the design and construction of road, highway, tollway, and expressway projects to reduce the need for the relocation of public water and wastewater infrastructure and to promote the deployment of broadband infrastructure and underground utility facilities in an efficient and competitively neutral process for all road, highway, tollway, and expressway projects. (b) The rules shall identify a Dig Once Coordinator within the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity that is responsible for facilitating the broadband infrastructure and underground utility facilities efforts in rights-of-way. The Dig Once Coordinator may be an existing employee with other responsibilities. (c) The rules shall not impair an entity's ability to maintain or upgrade networks or respond to situations that pose an imminent danger to life, health, or property or a utility or broadband service outage, which requires repair or action, including emergency excavation. (d) This Act, or the rules adopted under this Act, are not intended to delay the design or construction of road, highway, tollway, and expressway construction projects, and shall not be construed to provide authority to approve, deny, or delay broadband infrastructure projects or underground utility facilities projects.(Source: P.A. 103-378, eff. 1-1-24.) |