JIM MULVENNA
WESTFIELD – City officials are attempting to determine how much of a $40 million state allocation it can secure as the city continues to mend its winter-ravaged roads.
The state Department of Transportation is making $40 million available for pothole repair work, with about $30 million earmarked for cities and towns, but how those funds will be issued remains a question.
Public Works Superintendent Jim Mulvenna said this morning that the cost of repairs to city streets, following one of the worst winters in terms of damaged pavement, continues to escalate.
“I was running out of money and thinking about letting the private contractor go, but now I’ll keep going and try to get every street, every pothole, done,” Mulvenna said.
“I don’t really know how we’re actually going to get our hands on that state money. It’s probably going to be a reimbursement program,” Mulvenna said. “The Engineering Department estimates that we’d qualify for about $180,000.”
Mulvenna said that he has the contractors, Burke Brothers, and three DPW crews working to repair damaged roads.
“We’ve put down a hundred tons of asphalt over the past couple of weeks, then you add the labor costs and police officers for traffic control – I’ve had three or four a day working with the crews – it all adds up quickly,” Mulvenna said.
Several residents attended the Board of Public Works meeting Tuesday night to voice their dissatisfaction with the pothole repair program, complaining that too little money is available given the magnitude of the problem this year.
Matt Placzek of East Mountain Road said the city needs to go back to past practices.
“Years ago when they did it, they started at one end of a road and did the whole street rather than jumping around like they do now, jumping all over the city,” Placzek said. “East Mountain Road was only half done when they left.”
Mulvenna said that the crew repairing East Mountain Road ran out of material and that repair work was later completed.
Jimmy Smith of South Maple Street complained that he damaged a tire on Springdale Road.
“That road is a horror show,” Smith said. “It was raining and you couldn’t see how deep the pothole was when I hit one and blew a tire. There were two police cruisers out there because three cars blew tires in an hour.”
Mulvenna said that Springdale Road was among the first to be repaired because of the extent of surface damage which occurred this winter.
Mulvenna said that the DPW has spent more than $75,000 for materials to repair the pothole damage
