LIVERMORE — Selectpersons focused Monday evening on road maintenance, how much it costs and whether some of it should be contracted.
The proposed highway maintenance budget for 2019-20 is $357,961, up $2,976 from last year.
The highway capital improvement budget recommended by selectpersons is $395,000, up $45,000 from last year. The Budget Committee recommends $350,000, the same as last year.
Highway foreman Roger Ferland shared a ditching plan that Selectperson Tom Gould requested last week.
In the past, Ferland said, the town went through steps to hire someone and got prices but couldn’t afford to hire anyone to do the ditching. “I’m open for anything where we can save money and move forward faster,” he said.
Selectperson Wayne Timberlake said it took longer for Ferland to prepare cement pads at the transfer station and town office/fire station complex last year than expected.
“If he hadn’t spent time on that, he would have been on the roads,” Timberlake said.
Ferland said ditching is in decent shape, but wheel ruts are getting worse.
“Shimming the ruts would give people a place to drive,” he said. “There’s no pavement on these roads. They were built for horse and buggy and Model As,” he said.
“We’ve been putting 300 tons of cold mix a year, went up to 600 tons last year to smooth them out,” Ferland said. “We’ve improved quite a few spots. It’s bigger than 600 tons a year.”
Select Board Chairman Mark Chretien said, “We’re increasing the base to 12 inches (on rebuilt roads) so that they will last longer.”
Gould said the town spends $7,000 annually for contracted work.
“I’m not sure it’s the right way to go,” he said. “It’s a good place to start. It may be too disjointed to put a contractor on the roads. I was hoping we could have a block of roads for a contractor to work on, take that block off of Roger’s desk,” he said.
Selectperson Scott Richmond said roadside mowing was the biggest job for which contractors were used, and it needs to be done at least once a year.
Richmond said the highway maintenance budget is increasing this year mainly because $20,000 was cut from sand and salt last year. More material had to be purchased this year because of the number of ice storms.
Gould said, “We need to let people know what we’re doing, that we’re keeping a cushion. We need to have this discussion before town meeting.”
Ferland said the build-up of ice on the River Road has been taken care of.
“That road is all together different than a flat road, he said. There are cold areas where trees block the sun. If sun could get there, you’d see a difference in that road.”
Chretien said he would have more capital road improvement information available at the April 1 board meeting.
pharnden@sunmediagroup.net
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