Discussion on whether the Washington County Engineer’s Office fulfilled its duties for overlay work in the City of Crawfordsville was discussed for around 45 minutes at this week’s Board of Supervisors meeting.
As per a 28E agreement with the city dating back to 2004, the county hired LL Pelling, Co. to do a less than two-inch overlay on a two-mile stretch of Vine Avenue, or old Highway 218, from Columbus Street south. Work was completed in early September, and Supervisor Marcus Fedler asked that the matter be put on this week’s agenda as he received concerns over why 200 feet of the road north of Columbus Street wasn’t addressed. Thorius says he also received a comment from a Crawfordsville City Council member, but he reminded the supervisors that this was what they discussed and approved over the last year. Thorius mentioned that the contractor even asked him repeatedly why they were doing the overlay work in the first place, “Routine maintenance is all we’re supposed to be doing and that’s what this agreement talks about. I think we’ve done above and beyond what this agreement is, and it really boils down to, ‘Are we calling that lift we placed maintenance or construction?’ That’s allowed as maintenance per Iowa Code, but like I said other locations may have called that construction. Because they didn’t have local money to pay for it, they didn’t have Farm to Market money to pay for it, so that has to be construction dollars to pay for it.”
Supervisor Stan Stoops reasoned that he could see from Crawfordsville residents’ perspective that the ball was dropped on this project. In regards to the 17-year-old 28E agreement, Thorius said the only detail he thinks could be revisited is snow plowing.