Village to go out to bid for street project
MINSTER — Councilors passed a motion Tuesday night that lets the village seek bids for its upcoming 2022 minor street resurfacing project.
Village Administrator Don Harrod listed five portions of streets that they would like to resurface:
Ohio Street from Sixth to Seventh streets located by the village utility building; Jefferson Street from Third Street all the way until it ends at Calvary Chapel; Fifth Street from Main to Hanover streets; Fourth Street from Garfield Street to Paris Street and Seventh Street from Cleveland Street to the railroad tracks.
“We talked about doing all of Seventh Street, but since we’re going to do the Dues Ditch, we talked about waiting until next year,” said Harrod, saying later during his report that the village is wrapping up the easements needed for the ditch project.
Harrod said that estimate for the work amounts to $$299,708.10. He added that the village also has two alternate bids to resurface the utility building parking lot on North Ohio Street and improving the parking at the wastewater treatment plant.
Harrod said those two estimates were $168,125.80 and $52,390.75.
“We may be a little low on our estimate,” said Harrod. “I used $190 per cubic yard for asphalt and recent bids I’ve looked at from Choice One [Engineering] are coming in close to $270 to $300 per cubic yard.”
Also Tuesday, Harrod reported that the village has received 133 responses to the needs-assessment survey that is currently being circulated.
Councilor Craig Sherman said he was disappointed because only 500 surveys were sent out to village residents — he was under the assumption that the surveys would be going out to every resident.
Harrod said he would reach out to Miami University — the group who is helping the village with the surveys — to see if they could send out more.
“It’s good news that it’s out and I’ve heard a lot of positive things
about it,” said Sherman.
Also Tuesday, councilors discussed summer employment within the village and at the swimming pool.
Council approved 15 part-time and seasonal employees at the meeting, but the village is still in need of more workers.
Harrod said that the swimming pool needs 30 workers to cover the whole summer so the pool can remain operational.
Sherman asked Harrod if it wasn’t an issue of the wage, but Harrod thought that the wage — which is around $10.75 an hour — wasn’t an issue and cited kids’ involvement with sports and other activities during the summer keep them busy.
Applications can be picked up and returned at the village office for those interested.
In other business:
• Councilor Craig Oldiges reported that there will be some improvements done at the ball diamonds including painting some dugouts and replacing the roofs on some of them.
• Council passed 15 invoices over $3,000 including annual maintenance on the electrical substation as well as 26 electrical poles purchased by the village.
• Harrod reported that Brumbaugh Construction is continuing to move along with the Seventh Street reconstruction. He said that their crews did collapse a water line on Tuesday that left it without pressure, but the issue has since been resolved. He said that they should wrap up utility installation sometime this week and will then begin with excavation of the street.
• Harrod reported that the National Water Service will be in the village within the next couple of weeks to begin conducting the drilling of new test wells near the wastewater treatment facility.
The test wells will be used to determine if a viable source of water can be located that could be used for dilution of the village’s total dissolve solids coming from the water treatment facility.
• Harrod read total receipts for the month of March came in at $287,187.02, bringing the village’s total receipts for the year of $900,160.12.
• Entered executive session to discuss the hiring of personnel. No action was taken.
• The next council meeting is set for 6:30 p.m. on May 3.