GREENVILLE – The Darke County Board of Commissioners met Thursday to discuss bids, necessary actions, and opting out. Commissioners Matt Aultman, Marshall Combs, and Larry Holmes were present.
Jim Surber, the DC Engineer, was present for the opening and reading of the sealed bids for the Darke County cooperative resurfacing project that includes ten Townships. This project typically happens every two years within the county.
“The project will resurface 25.272 miles of rural roads at an estimated cost of $2,507,335. 13.252 miles of this will be on Township roads with 12.020 miles on Country roads,” Surber said.
The costs will consist of a one-half inch leveling layer of asphalt, covered by a one inch surface layer of asphalt. There will also be shoulder aggregate on the sides.
“The cost of the project will be borne by a $900,000 grant from the Ohio Public Works Commission and local participation by the County Engineer and ten Boards of Trustees of Darke County Townships,” Surber said.
He advised the grant is expected to provide approximately 35 percent of the project cost, and the the project had been in the planning stages for two years. The contract must be awarded before Sept. 15, 2023.
“The current costs for resurfacing rural roads is approximately $98,000 per mile for Township roads and $103,000 for County roads,” Surber said.
The Engineer’s estimates were as follows: County roads total $1,234,880.36; Township roads total $1,272,454.70; and a grand total of $2,507,335.06. The project bid totals are to not exceed no more than 10 percent of the total estimated cost. If the project total is over 10 percent of the engineer’s estimate, the big can not be awarded to the company.
A total of two bids were received for the project. Out of a total of 10 Township roads and three County roads, the Shelly Company only bid on three township roads. Their total for those three roads was $352,754, and they did not bid on any County roads.
Walls Bros. Asphalt Company’s total for the whole project was $2,627,995.30. This total split into $1,275,140.50 for the County roads and $1,352,854.80 for the Township roads. The commissioners voted to accept the bids for the engineer’s review.
There was a vote to authorize the actions necessary to affect a Government Electricity Aggregation Program. The aggregation is where the Ohio law allows for communities to form aggregated buying groups to purchase electric generation on behalf of their citizens.
The aggregation gains group buying power and typically can negotiate a better price with the supplier than each aggregation group member could have negotiated individually.
“This is an initiative we are putting on to aggregate the electricity for the township and unzoned portions of the county,” Aultman said.
He said this excludes the townships of Adams, Brown, and Greenville because they already have aggregation agreements in place.
“This allows the county to conglomerate all the folks who are on AES electric, and it allows up to go buy down the rates in the county,” Aultman said.
This concept will be on the ballot come November, and will be up to all the folks in those townships. There will be public hearings and an opt out program between the county program and the suppliers themselves.
“There is going to be a time frame of if you don’t want to be engaged in this, you can opt out of the aggregation,” Aultman said.
Holmes said it gives an option to residence, and it does not keep them from accepting a different rate option from a different provider.
“It is just another option that can be presented to an individual,” Holmes said.
Residents seeking to join a governmental aggregation program will be able to opt into it once it passes with a majority of votes. Residents will not need to do anything to join the program; however, anyone who does not want to participate in the program can easily opt out by returning a form, which will be mailed to all eligible members.
A letter of interest was sent to Kirk Herath with OH Persistent Cyber Improvement for local government and critical infrastructure. The letter is stating the interest and support in the cybersecurity assessment and training program.
Dale Musser, Facility & Safety Manager, had looked over four quotes for the sidewalks repairs and replacements within the Greenville City Limits. The County has several areas in the city that are being requested to be repaired and replaced with handicap accessible ramps to be added.
Four concrete companies were asked to bid on the project, and only two quotes were received. Sowers bid a total of $18,700, and Primetime project cost $12,925. It was Musser’s recommendation to go with the Primetime Construction, and the commissioners approved.
Commissioner Holmes attended the Transportation Advisory Committee and City of Greenville Transit meeting Wednesday. He gave a recap of the event saying there is more work that needs to be done.
“It was extremely lightly attended. Most of the committee did not show up,” Holmes said. “We did have enough that we could take action.”
Holmes said the committee did approve the same transportation that was provided to the Great Darke County Fair with the same regulations as the previous year, so those services will be provided again.
“We, unfortunately, did not get to follow up on some of the topics that we talked about at the last commissioners’ meeting,” Holmes said.
The Darke County Commissioners’ office will be closed next Tuesday in observance of the holiday. They will resume regular sessions on Thursday, July 6th at 1:30 p.m.
