Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) secretary Mike Carroll recognized 31 PennDOT employees for their outstanding performance with the Star of Excellence Award, PennDOT's highest recognition during a ceremony held in Harrisburg on Sept. 26.

Two employees from PennDOT's District 8, which represents Adams, Cumberland, Dauphin, Franklin, Lancaster, Lebanon, Perry and York counties, plus nine employees from PennDOT's Central Office in Harrisburg, were among the honorees.

A local award recipient was Robert "Rob" J. Mulkerin Jr. of Middletown, assistant strategic management transportation. Mulkerin worked to develop and implement a strategy for PennDOT's approach to the competitive funding, particularly focused on the highway and bridge funding available under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

With competition for the limited funding, his approach centered on increasing eligible applications awareness of opportunities, and focusing the department's efforts to maximize the ability to bring additional federal funding to Pennsylvania for established priority needs.

Pennsylvania has the chance to compete for billions of dollars in additional funding under a wide range of grant programs. Almost all the grant programs utilize merit criteria. Merit criteria for most of the grant programs focus on things such as safety, environmental sustainability, quality of life, mobility and community connectivity, economic competitiveness and opportunity, state of good repair, innovation and partnership and collaboration.

In addition to helping develop and coordinate the distribution of guidance information, Mulkerin took the lead role in the development and submission of multiple applications for PennDOT and was the key part of the team that developed and submitted the application that secured an additional $69 million for the Central Susquehanna Valley Thruway project.