Commission talks road repair

The list of needs for work on Crawford County roads is seemingly endless, Crawford County commissioners said on Friday. However, the amount of funds to do that work is not endless.

Friday, commissioners began discussing the work that needs to be done in the coming year and how to pay for those projects. Each commissioner brought a laundry list of planned projects for their districts, but a further narrowing of those lists will have to come after the costs add up to more than the commission has available to spend.

For further reference, commissioners were given estimates of the cost of different types of work that can be done to repair roads. A one-mile chip-and-seal project is estimated to run about $13,000. If milling is required, the estimate jumps closer to $43,000-$57,000 per mile depending on the type of oil used, if not more.

Commissioner Bob Kmiec identified roughly 25 miles of chip-and-seal work that needs to be done to roads in his district. That includes six miles of 20th Street, five miles of 680th Street west of Kansas Highway 7, nine miles of Gooding Road, two miles “around the edge of Girard” and three miles west of McCune on 510th Street.

“There are spots in it starting to show a lot of wear. If we have a bad winter, it could come apart. I’d rather be prepared to fix it before that happens,” Kmiec said.

Commissioner Linda Grilz suggested just five miles of projects in her district, but at more work — and more cost — is expected for her projects. Grilz said she would like to mill the three to four miles from U.S. Highway 69 to Bone Creek Reservoir and then chip and seal it.

“That road is important to me because of economic development. On that lake right now, every Thursday, there’s a bass tournament that draws 35-50 boats, so that’s 60-75 people,” Grilz said. “According to Jim Zaleski [Labette County Tourism Bureau director], every time he schedules a tournament at Bone Creek, they lose anglers. When contacted, they say they do not want to go to a lake that you have to drive on a dirt road to get to.”

Other commissioners had mixed reactions to Grilz’ goals of improved access to Bone Creek.

“From an economic standpoint, you might have a point,” Kmiec said. “I don’t think you have the money in the budget to do that this year.”

Grilz said that the project was important and would be better than other options that require more regular upkeep.

“I want to get the base right, so we don’t have to touch it for 10 years. To me, that’s better than putting rock, blading and dust control over and over and over again,” Grilz said.

The other project in her district is one mile east from U.S. 69 on 610th Street.

Commissioner Carl Wood said he had about eight miles of work that needed to be chipped and sealed, including about four miles around Langdon Lane, about one mile on 510th Street, and several roads throughout his territory that had not been had any work “since 1991.”

“I pulled back last year, but I can’t pull back this year. Those roads are getting worse,” Wood said.

The commissioners have $360,000 set aside in the budget for “patching” and $138,000 earmarked for chipping. Commissioners estimated that all of their projects would combine to about $458,000. There’s just one problem: carryover.

Commissioners have to leave a certain amount leftover in the budget at the end of each fiscal year to pay for bills incurred in the last few months. Typically, the carryover is a little more than $100,000. If that is the case, then some of the projects each of the commissioners have planned will have to get cut.

Kmiec and Wood suggested that the road to Bone Creek, while important, may not be the best expenditure of funds.

“I don’t see where the money is for all that,” Wood said. “I agree with you that we need to do it, and if we do it, we need to do it right; I agree 100 percent or we don’t do it at all. I just don’t see the room in the budget for it.”

Kmiec said that the money would be better off spent on the public in general rather than on “special interests.”

“It isn’t special interest, though,” Grilz said. “It’s an investment in our county. Economic development comes in a lot of different forces, from a dog track to a fishing lake.”

Grilz suggested that the nine miles of Gooding Road would be a good candidate for next year’s work, as it would be difficult to chip and seal the road while traffic is being rerouted to it because of the construction on Kansas Highway 47 east of Girard.

Grilz later suggested that the commission comes up with a plan for addressing repairs in the county for the future.

At the end of the discussion, the commissioners decided to each re-examine their needs and to create a master list of projects they each have planned, then to meet up again in the coming meetings to hash out exactly which projects will be selected.

Andrew Nash can be reached at andrew.nash@morningsun.net or by calling 231-2600 ext. 140.