lamborn-dougThe Colorado Department of Transportation has lost $114.7 million, which would have helped build roads and fund bridge projects.

That represents a quarter of the transportation funding the state would get from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and is “absolutely devastating to our highway program” says Tony Milo, president of the Colorado Contractors Association, which represents the various companies that do the work (via the Denver Business Journal).

The money was cut based on a technicality that has affected roughly $8.7 billion in transportation funds across the nation, and U.S. Senators Mark Udall and Michael Bennet now want the rule repealed. While the news seems to come as a shocker, insiders had time to plan, says Cathy St. Denis, a spokeswoman for the Federal Highway Administration: “States have known about this; they knew what the amounts were going to be.”

Recently, several of the state’s representatives have signed a letter urging Congress to retain the transportation money, although two, Mike Coffman and Doug Lamborn (pictured), both Republicans, voted against it, according to The Colorado Independent.