City street projects wind down
BY MICHAEL JOHNSON
Editor
Commissioners voted to move forward with surveying for the next big street project in town at Monday’s regular city commission meeting. No total costs are yet available from this year’s improvements.
An assessment committee tasked with figuring out how the costs will be assessed to the community has not come out with their final decision on the assessments. What is clear, is those residents that had water or sewer improvements will pay for the cost of their portion as they directly benefit. The street district to be assessed includes all of Washburn, so the costs can spread further.
Not to fall behind on improvements, commissioner Derek Laning gave a rough idea of the intended street improvement areas for next year. Those included Main Avenue starting near the business district, and headed to the southeast up to the 15th Street. New pavement would then wrap down 15th St. to 1st Ave. and back up 14th St. Portions of that are now gravel, so determining if street and gutter is preferred is one question commissioners are looking for comment on.
While figuring that out, city engineer Jasper Klein suggested they do some surveying of the roads so that work is complete ahead of next year. His schedule included opening for bids in March. In contrast, this year’s project had an opening date of May. While things have worked out well, commissioners were eager to be ahead of schedule rather than trying to beat the snow.
