BROWNSTOWN — The town recently secured $375,817.32 in state funding to improve Poplar Street south from Vallonia Road to Cummins Street.
On Monday night during a meeting at the town hall, the Brownstown Town Council agreed to pay a North Vernon engineering firm, FPBH Inc., $48,500 to design the project and provide observation services during construction.
The state funding will come from a Community Crossings Matching Grant the town received in early November.
The state requires towns to contribute 25% in matching funds, which must be used for road projects.
In this case, the total cost of the project is $549,042.
The council plans to use some of the revenue that has been accumulating in the town’s motor vehicle highway and local streets and roads funds to pay the 25% match, which includes FPBH’s bill. Grant funds cannot be used for design and engineering services.
Town Clerk-Treasurer David Willey said the paperwork was completed this past week.
“So you’re ready to go with bidding this project out,” engineer Bernie Hauersperger said. “We need some time to design a plan, though.”
Hauersperger, who is with FPBH, said the project, which includes curb ramps, is not going to be easy to design.
“We have a lot of widening to do, and we have to do drainage the right way to make sure the water exits out to the different exit points,” Hauersperger said.
The projected schedule has the bid process starting with advertisements in newspapers by Feb. 12, 2024. The bids would be opened March 18 and awarded March 31. The notice to the winning contractor to proceed with construction would be issued March 22, and the final completion date for the project would be Nov. 1. All of those dates are tentative.
“There is no real hurry,” Hauersperger said. “We would like to bid it sooner, obviously. We would like to beat these dates.”
He said the town should receive good bids because it will happen before the first round of Community Crossings Matching Grants are released in 2024.
The town council with the help of Street Superintendent Shawn Ross selected paving projects based on the town’s Pavement Surface Evaluation and Rating, aka PASER, system of the 15.7 miles of streets and roads.