§ 228. Payment of state aid. 1. The county superintendent shall notify the commissioner when work has been commenced on an approved project. As work progresses on a project according to approved plans and specifications, a town may request the state aid in relation thereto to be paid in installments or it may request such aid to be paid after a project has been completed.

2. Claims for such aid shall be made on forms prepared and furnished by the commissioner. They shall be executed in the name of the town by the town superintendent or, where such work is done pursuant to a contract with the county or with an independent contractor, the town board may authorize the town supervisor to execute such claims instead of the town superintendent. Such claims, when approved by the county superintendent, shall be filed with the commissioner. The commissioner shall examine such claims and shall certify to the state comptroller within thirty days of the receipt of such claims the amounts which the state should pay thereon to the supervisor of the town. If any such claim or any portion thereof be disapproved, the commissioner shall immediately notify the town board, the board of supervisors and county superintendent of such action. Any such claim must be filed with the commissioner in the year for which the project was approved or not later than the thirty-first day of January in the calendar year succeeding that for which the project was approved except where work has been deferred with the approval of the commissioner for completion during the following construction season. The commissioner shall not otherwise certify payment of the final installment of state aid for any project unless the work thereon has been completed according to approved plans but all other installments may be paid with the final installment allocated to stabilization and surfacing materials deferred until so completed.

3. In the final adjustment of any claim, if it is determined that a town has been paid an amount in excess of that permitted under this article, the state comptroller shall withhold an equivalent amount from any state aid payable to the town pursuant to sections two hundred seventy-nine and two hundred eighty of the highway law.