Dozens of people gathered in a driveway near the intersection of Gayfer Road and County Road 13 Saturday morning to get some answers from the county about the delay of the roundabout being constructed at the intersection.
County Commission Chairman Chris Elliott and County Engineer Joey Nunnally met and talked with nearby residents for over a half hour, listening to concerns and trying to explain some of the delays to the project that was supposed to be completed on Sept. 3.
“I understand this is a tremendous inconvenience,” Elliott said. “It will be a big improvement when it is finished, as they have been very successful around the county so far, as they have reduced accidents and helped traffic flow.”
Elliott said the project began June 13 and that the county had given the go ahead to the contractor to close the intersection so the construction could “move faster,” which drew laughter from the crowd.
Elliott said he felt that was the beginning of the problem.
“I’m a contractor and when someone says go, you better be ready to proceed,” Elliott said. “The time charges started on June 6 and on June 13, they began work. Some of that lies with the contractor.”
Elliott said there were 90 calendar days on the project timeline and it was supposed to be finished Sept. 3, but said some extensions had been granted to the project by the state department of transportation because ATRIP grant funds were used for the construction.
“ALDOT gets to examine those extension requests and make recommendations and approvals for those extensions of time,” Elliott said. “I could spend the entire morning on how frustrating dealing with the state department of transportation can be at times. If it were up to me, the answer would be different, but, sadly, it’s not up to me or the county.”
According to the county, Tropical Storm Cindy gave the contractor a 7-day extension.
“Obviously, when there is pouring down rain, the contractor can’t work in those conditions,” Elliott said. “However, there has been plenty of time where there has not been rain that the contractor could have been working and we have had that conversation.”
The contractor also got a 20-day extension due to “unsuitable soil” on the site due to issues with rain absorption into the existing soil, according to the county engineer.
“The problem comes in when it starts to sitting in rain for about 30 inches of rain,” Nunnally said. “You can’t hardly get it to dry out, so to make the process go faster, we brought in a different process to try to help speed things along, like a bridge over the bad soil. It should have helped the contractor move forward so that they wouldn’t have to be sitting out here waiting for soil to dry.”
Nunnally said it cost a little extra money but was the right decision to make to help move the project along.
“What we were faced with is do I come out here and tell y’all the dirt is wet, or do we figure out a way around it with the geo grid so we can get back to work as quickly as possible,” Elliott said.
Elliott said a 14-day extension was granted due to a “Fairhope Utility delay,” something he said has been an issue with several roads projects across the Eastern Shore this year.
“Some of y’all know may know that I’ve had my issues with Fairhope Utilities,” Elliott said. “I don’t know what to say except it’s been a little frustrating. There’s been a change in administration, and, for whatever it’s worth, we’ve had some difficult times from the county’s perspective getting Fairhope to mark their utilities prior to construction, getting them to move their utilities before construction, getting Fairhope to properly mark their utilities and even getting them to accept that the things we’re looking at directly in the ground in front of them is actually a Fairhope Utility sewer line.”
Elliott said county staff even had to drill in one line to prove to Fairhope Utility officials that it was an active sewer line.
“It certainly smelled like one after we did that,” Elliott quipped. “That was an issue here, and an issue over on 32 and 181 as well.”
Elliott informed the crowd that the contractor for the roundabout project, Arrington Curb and Excavation, was also the contractor for the 32 and 181 project, due to low bidder rules put in place by ALDOT.
“When we got so messed up over there because of a sewer line location issue, it caused the timeline to get messed up over here,” Elliott said. “It kept getting delayed and delayed and delayed, which has clearly impacted the construction on this project.”
Residents urged Elliott and Nunnally to make sure Arrington would not receive any further construction projects from the county, in light of the issues with recent projects, but Elliott said the county’s hands were somewhat tied because of the low bid laws put in place by the state.
“If this were purely a county project, believe me, it wouldn’t be an issue,” Elliott said. “But because the state is involved, we have to play by their rules.”
Elliott asked the crowd to contact the state legislature to possibly change the rules that would allow counties more leeway in picking contractors.
Residents also asked Elliott and Nunnally if there were any possible penalties for any time overruns by the contractor.
Nunnally said the state does allow the county to assess fines for days outside of the contracted number, and the amount of the fees are around $900 per day.
Elliott said as of Sept. 16, 79 percent of the project days had been used and 45 percent of the project budget has been used. Elliott said the contractor had been on site for 88 days, which drew laughter and negative comments from the crowd.
“Their equipment might have been here, but there were no bodies here,” one neighbor said.
Several others said they didn’t feel much work had been done at all on the project until the recent days.
“There haven’t been crews doing efficient work for 50 days on this project until today,” one resident said.
Many agreed.
“This has been more work today than what’s been going on the last two months,” another resident said.
Residents urged Elliott and Nunnally to keep county officials on the site to “make sure the contractor stays working,” with one nearby homeowner asking if it was possible to mount cameras on the site for the duration of the project.
“That’s something we can definitely look into,” Elliott said.
Elliott said the new anticipated completion date would be Nov. 3, and he said the county would do everything it could to make sure the contractor would be finished by that time.
“I know how frustrated many of you must be because of all of this, but know that we are doing everything we possibly can to move this forward and finish this project,” Elliott said. “Our hand are tied in some regards, but we will keep on the contractor and get this finished in a timely manner.”
